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LECTURES wo¥ 


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BY 


REV. BENJAMIN GODWIN, D.D. 


AUTHOR OF LECTURES AGAINST ATHEISM. 


“ Homo sum}; humani nihila me alienum puto.”’—TERENCE. 


“ Remember them that are in bonds, as bound with them.’’—HeEs. xiii. 3. 


FROM THE LONDON EDITION, 


WITH ADDITIONS TO THE AMERICAN EDITION. 


BOSTON: 
JAM is B. DOW. 
1836. 


Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1836, by 
Wiuram §S. ANDREWS, 
in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of Massachusetts. 


PRINTED BY WILLIAM A. Hatt & Co. 


# $ Hi, 


PREFACE 


TO THE AMERICAN EDITION. 


Tue Lectures upon Slavery, which compose this work, 
were written by Dr. Godwin, in England, during the 
period when the question of emancipation, in the British 
West-India Islands, was before Parliament and the En- 
glish nation. They were delivered, in that country, to 
highly intelligent, respectable, and crowded audiences ; 
and were listened to by them with breathless attention and 
deep interest. The strong impression produced by them 
upon the public mind and feeling, both in their delivery 
and perusal, without doubt contributed very much to the 
production of that powerful national sentiment, which 
continued to gather strength in its progress, until, with 
the power of a cataract, it swept over the whole land, 
—bore down, with irresistible impulse, every obstacle 
before it, and finally produced the abolition of slavery in 
the whole British Empire. 

That such may be the effect which it shall produce in 
the United States, also, we ardently hope; and it is only 
necessary that it should be introduced to the public at- 


62037. 


6 PREFACE. 


ignorance, delusion ,infidelity,and barbarism. In their 
march up the firmament, they have reached our beloved 
country; and God grant that their cheering rays may en- 
lighten our intellectual atmosphere, and warm and in- 
vigorate our moral soil, as they have done that of our 


father land. 
AMERICAN EDITOR. 


PREFACE. 


Wuen the following Lectures were delivered, the Au- 
thor had not the remotest idea of publication; but as he 
has ventured to come before the public, he begs to say a 
few words in explanation of his reasons and his object. 
From his earliest years he felt a hatred to oppression: 
his love of liberty, civil and religious, ‘grew with his 
growth, and strengthened with his strength.” He no 
sooner heard of slavery in the British dominions, and the 
miseries necessarily attendant on such a state, than he 
deeply deplored the case of the injured Negro. He was 
too young to take any part in the great struggle for the 
abolition of the slave trade, though he sincerely rejoiced 
in that great triumph of humanity. Since 1823, howev- 
er, he has takena more lively interest inthe subject; and 
towards the close of the last year, by means of the infor- 
mation which was laid before the public, from time to 
time, his mind became so strongly impressed with the 
subject, that it followed him night and day: he felt that, 
for the peace of his own mind, he must make some at- 
tempt on behalf of his suffering fellow-creatures; it be- 


8 PREFACE. 


came a point of conscience. The inquiry then arose, 
what could he do, engaged as he was as tutor in a Dis- 
senting college, and pastor of a church and congregation ? 
The first thing suggested was, to preach on the subject; 
but, besides the probability that many might hesitate to 
come toa Dissenting chapel, there were many topics 
connected with slavery which appeared scarcely suited 
to the pulpit. He thought then of lecturing in the public 
room of the Exchange; but the idea was new, and he 
hesitated ; but, on mentioning it to some respected friends, 
he was encouraged to proceed. The experiment succeed- 
ed. The delivery of the Lectures was honored by a nu- 
merous, respectable, and attentive audience; and he had 
the happiness of seeing that his immediate object was 
accomplished,—information was extended, and a general 
interest was excited in the neighborhood. The Lectures 
were afterwards delivered, by request, at York and Scar- 
borough. Many invitations came from different places, 
to which the Author could not attend: in fact, from the 
additional labor and excitement his health began to suf- 
fer, and his immediate duties would not admit of his 
proceeding any further in this course. He received 
many requests to publish, which he uniformly resisted, 
till it was suggested, that, though there were many works 
extant on the subject, yet there was not one which 
exhibited it as a whole; and that, as the Lectures gavea 
connected and condensed view of all the principal facts 


and arguments connected with Negro slavery, the work 


PREFACE. 9 


might be useful as a kind of text-book, to those who wish- 
ed at this particular crisis to make themselves acquainted 
with the subject, and might not have time or inclination 
to examine the details in a large number of books and 
pamphlets. With the hope of serving the cause of Ne- 
gro freedom, he has committed the Lectures to the press. 
How far the Author has done right in publishing, and 
whether the work is adapted to promote the end which 
he has in view, the public will judge. 

As to the execution, there are some circumstances 
which the Author thinks entitle him to the candor of the 
public. Such are his engagements, that the time devoted 
to a preparation of the Lectures for the press has been 
what should have been given to rest from the fatigues 
and exhaustion which his various duties occasion; and 
as it was considered desirable that the work, if published 
at all, should be out in time for circulation before the 
meeting of Parliament, there has been and could be no 
opportunity for a careful revision. The Lectures were 
not read, nor delivered memoriter, though copious notes 
had been taken: in writing them out for the press, it was 
therefore impossible to secure the same mode of expres- 
sion in every instance as was employed in the delivery ; 
and this also will account for the additional time requi- 
site in preparing them for publication. The Author 
wishes that he could have rendered them in this respect 
more worthy the acceptance of the public: but he wishes 


this to be understood of the composition only ; for the 


10 PEEEACE. 


statements which are made, and the reasonings which 
are employed, he asks no mercy: let them stand at the 
bar of justice. He believes that no fact produced willbe 
found to be materially incorrect ; nor is he aware of any 
thing unsound in the various lines of argument which he 
has taken. These, however, he is perfectly willing to 


submit to a fair and honest criticism. 


Bowling Cottage, near Bradford, Yorkshire, 
September 7, 1830. 


CONTENTS. 


LECTUREH I. 


GENERAL VIEW OF SLAVERY. 


Design AND PLaN or THE LECTURES page 17 
GEOGRAPHICAL AND Hisroricat Notices - eee 
Africa - - = ~ é - - - ib. 
The West Indies - - - - - + 25 
GENERAL VIEW OF THE SLAVE SYSTEM - - - 28 
White, Black, and Colored Population - ib. 
Employmentofthe Slaves - - - - 3i 
Cultivation of the Sugar Cane -~ - - 33 
Manufacture of Sugar - - - ai 1B 
Holeing - - - . - - - 34 
The Driving Whip - = =i! SPL 
Provisions - - - - - - - 40 
Principat FEATURES OF THE SLAVE SYSTEM - ae 
Yroof.—Resolutions of 1823 - - - 46 
CONCLUSION” - - - ~ . - - =, 52 


12 CONTENTS. 


LECTURE II. 


THE EVILS OF SLAVERY. 


P, 

PRELIMINARY REMARKS - - - - «+ = 53 

NatTuRAL EvILs - : - . “ 2 "oe 
The Negroes torn from Africa—Why this is 

noticed = - S - “ - - ib. 


General Treatment of the Slaves in the Col- 

onies, as to Labor, Food, and Punishment 59 
Their Situation in reference to Society at 

large - - - - . a ~ oe 
Inequality of Law and Right ~~ - - - ib. 
The manner in which Justice is administered 79 

The Difficulty of Redress—Inadmissibility of 
Evidence = - - ~ - - 8 
The Misery inflicted on every social Feeling 93 

The whole State that of complete Degrada- 


tion - ~ . - - - - - 97 
Free Blacks and Persons of Color not entire- 
ly exempt - - - - - - 106 
Mora Evi.s or THE SystTEM - - - - 108 
On the Victims of its Oppression - - ib. 
A Re-action on all who administer the System 110 
Particular Evils resulting from it . - 112 
With Reference to Africa - - - - 123 


PouiticAL Evits. 


Maintained at a vast Expense - - ~ 125 
Bounties, &c. - - - - - 126 
Waste of Human Life - - - - ib. 

To the Injury of our Commerce and Manu- 

factures = - - - - - ib. 


National Guilt - . ~ - - - 127 


CONTENTS, 


LECTURE IU, 


THE UNLAWFULNESS OF SLAVERY. 


OBJECTIONS TO THE STATEMENTS OF THE Last LeEc- 
TURE NOTICED - - - m - ~ - 
That the Slaves are better off than our Peas- 

antry - - “ = = = 

That they are contented and happy if left to 
themselves - - - - - P 

That it is the Interest of the Planters to use 

their Slaves well - - - 2 = 

That the Accounts of the Miseries of Slavery 

are exaggerated . - - - - 


PRELIMINARY EXPLANATIONS - = = - - 


SLAVERY, A VIOLATION OF THE NATURAL RiGHTS OF 
Man . § isisolo-ed3 to cig: ro - 


What they are, and in what Cases they may 
be suspended - = E y 
Application to our Colonial Stavery - - 


OBJECTIONS, OR SUPPOSED PALLIATIONS - -~— - 
A Participation in the original Act denied - 
The Slaves originally Captives or Criminals 
The Negroes an inferior Race - . - 


CoNTRARY TO THE SPIRIT AND PRACTICE OF THE Brit- 
IsH CONSTITUTION - - = " e 2 


Explanatory Remarks +002 WISISOR .- 
Application - - - - - - 
Law of Nations violated by Slavery - ~— - 
Notice of Arguments derived from the gene- 

ral Prevalence and Antiquity of Slavery— 


128 


130 


135 


135 
140 


141 


142 
146 
148 

ib. 
149 
153 


158 

ib. 
159 
161 


14 CONTENTS. 


P. 
Acts of Parliament—and Jewish Slavery - 165 


OprosED To THE NaTuRE AND TENDENCY OF CuHRIS- 


TIANITY - - - - - - - 173 
Concessions - - - - - - ib. 
Views which Christianity gives of God - 176 
Views which it gives of Man - = - 177 
The Dispositions which it inculcates - - 180 
The Duties which it requires - - - 181 


LECTURE IV. 


THE ABOLITION OF SLAVERY. 


A VIEW OF WHAT HAS ALREADY BEEN DONE - - 188 
The Origin of the Colonial Slavery -  - ib. 
The Progress and Extent of the Slave Trade 189 

lst Pertod.—By whom reprobated_ - a ee 
State of Slavery in the Colonies - -  - ib. 
Granville Sharp - - - - - - 190 
The Decision of the Judges in Westminster 
Hall - - - - - - - 192 
2d Period.—Various Advocates of the Negroes _ ib. 
132 Slaves thrown overboard alive - - 193 
Efforts of Friends - - - - - 194 
Mr. Clarkson and Mr. Wilberforce - - ib. 
Society formed for the Abolition a. UB "05 
The great Contest - - - 196 
The Abolition of the Slave Trade - - 197 
3d Period.—State of the Slaves - - - 198 


Resolutions of 1823 > - - - - 201 


CONTENTS. 


4th Period.—Conduct of Government and Colo- 
nial Authorities - - - - - 
Review of what has been done - - - 
In the Crown Colonies - - * - 
In the Chartered Colonies - - - ~ 

The Condition in which Slaves are still left 


Inquiry INTO THE Duty or THE FRIENDS oF RELI- 
GION AND OF Humanity - - - . - 
The Slaves claim our Sympathy -  -~ - 

Are entitled to our active Efforts on their Be- 

half - - ~ - - - - - 


WHATIS THE OBJECT TO WHICH OUR EFFORTS SHOULD 
BE DIRECTED? - - - - - - - 
Should it be Amelioration or Abolition 2? - 


15 


203 
207 
208 
ib 
209 


210 
ib. 


212 


217 
ib. 


Its supposed Interference with vested Rights - 218 
The Question of Compensation considered - 220 


Should we aim at gradual or immediate Abo- 
lition ? = ERP oe ae MMC eta ea 
Reasons on both Sides —- - . - 


In wHaT MANNER SHOULD WE SEEK THE ABOLITION 
oF SLavery 2 ~ - ~ - - - 
Should we discourage Slave Produce? - — - 
Petitions - - - - - - - 
Elections - - - - - - - 


APPEALS ON THE CONDITION OF THE ENSLAVED NE- 
GROES TO 

Our Benevolence : : - J : 

Our Patriotism - . F ‘ f a 

Our Piety - . = = . m " 


Two CavTIons = a “ 4 at 7 3 
CONCLUSION < if 2 ~ _ v b 


226 
227 


238 
242 
247 
250 


251 
252 
2503 


254 
257 


ain He 
“pallida aatorsts 
apie ant 76: =r 


cy 
, 


\ 
He Paasone  epet ‘E. ait nour Oe dats 
Az" 


-— 





LECTURES, &c. 


LECTURE LI. 


In presenting myself to your notice as a Lecturer, 
the inquiry is very natural and reasonable, why I thus 
solicit your attention. My reply is, that I stand for- 
ward on behalf of suffering humanity, and venture to 
plead the cause of nearly a million of my fellow-crea- 
tures and fellow-subjects. 

On most of the topics to which I shall advert, the 
press has, I admit, communicated ample and authentic 
information ; and through the same medium many pow- 
erful appeals have been made to the public feeling. 
But all that is printed is not read; oral instruction is 
frequently more effectual than written information ; and, 
in addresses to the consciences or the feelings, there is 
a power in the living voice which all the machinery of 
the press cannot command. Hence, on the most sa- 
cred themes, the written Scriptures have not rendered 

2 


18 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


the labors of preachers unnecessary or unprofitable. 
Most of the sciences have long been taught in this man- 
ner in our great seminaries of learning ; and now the 
importance of public lectures in conveying knowledge 
begins to be generally recognized, so that this mode of 
instruction is becoming increasingly prevalent. We 
have, in the present day, lecturers in almost every 
branch of science, and in every department of know- 
ledge, traversing the country, enlightening the public 
mind, and exciting an interest in literature, in philoso- 
phy, in politics. 

The commodious, I may say, elegant building in 
which we are now assembled, the erection of which is 
an honor to those under whose auspices it was raised, 
and an ornament to the town in which we live, was 
scarcely finished, when it was occupied by a gentleman 
who called your attention to the wonders of the Heav- 
ens. He was succeeded, with scarcely an interval, by 
another, who taught the power of Eloquence and the 
graces of Elocution, and who, by his recitations, afford- 
ed no less amusement than instruction. I venture now 
to follow in the train, but with a far different object. 
You contemplated with pleasure the harmony, the beau- 
ty and the glory of the celestial phenomena: I ask you 
now to behold the wretchedness and misery of earthly 
scenes. I hold out no promise of pleasure and amuse- 
ment: Ihave to tell a tale of woe, and that not the fic- 
tion of creative fancy, framed only for the excitement of 
sensibility, but real facts and serious truths.—My sub- 
ject is SLAVERY! 


LECTURE I. 19 


The very term is shocking to an Englishman who 
has not been familiarized to the sad scene till he has 
ceased to feel. A love of freedom seems to be drawn 
in with the very air we breathe. Liberty is the spirit 
which pervades our laws; it is the presiding genius of 
the constitution. The history of Britain is that of a 
perpetual struggle for civil and religious liberty. It is 
a subject on which our historians love to dwell: its 
blessings are sung by our poets ; and often have its in- 
spirations kindled the fire of eloquence and the glow of 
fancy, while the walls of the British senate have re- 
sounded with the favorite theme. 

My object in the present lectures is, in the first place, 
to communicate information. I believe this is needed. 
I cannot think that, if all England knew the present 
state of Slavery, in the British dominions, and what is 
paid in public property and human life to support it, 
the system would be tolerated by a free and generous 
people. The condition of the enslaved Negro must, 
I think, when known, touch a sympathetic chord in eve- 
ry heart, where interest and prejudice do not indurate 
the feelings and exclude conviction. I wish my pres- 
ent auditory to know, that they may feel; and to feel, 
that they may act. ‘The subject is one that should ex- 
cite commiseration, but not despair. Itis an evil of 
long standing, of enormous extent, and of tremendous 
power, both in the infliction of misery and in the resist- 
ance which it opposes to every effort of amelioration ;* 





* We wish our readers to notice this. Slavery isa relation 
essentially evil. There is no good in it—nothing that can be made 


20 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


but it is not beyond the reach of remedy. It can be re- 
moved—it must be removed—and sooner or later it 
will be removed, in mercy or in judgment. And that 
we may contribute our portion of aid towards the peace- 
able extinction of this cruel and degrading system, is the 
final object I propose in these lectures. 

I confess that, though accustomed to public speaking, 
I experience much diffidence on the present occasion ; 
nor is it without a considerable expense of feeling that 
I engage in this undertaking. But there were two 
things which strongly urged me to it: the one, a sym- 
pathy for the poor suffering Negro; the other, a sense 
of duty. I felt bound in conscience to contribute my 
mite of influence towards the removal of an evil, which, 
while it inflicts unnumbered miseries on hundreds of 
thousands of our fellow-creatures and fellow-subjects, is 
a foul blot on our national character, and a crying sin 
in the sight of Heaven. If I fail in exciting that por- 
tion of interest which I humbly hope will attend these 
lectures, I shall still have the satisfaction of an approv- 
ing conscience. It wasa high commendation bestowed 
by the Saviour on a poor woman of old, “ She hath done 
what she could.” 

The plan I propose is, first, to give a general view of 


good. Itisa circumstance which robs man of his prerogatives. 
Disguise it as you may, still it holds the man in subjection to 
another’s will, it holds him liable to the incidents that may befal 
his property. The first thing, therefore, to be done for the im- 
provement of aslave, is to break this yoke, and secure to him 
the rights of a man. Am. Ep. 


LECTURE I. Q1 


the state of Slavery, as it exists in the British domin- 
ions; then, to show more fully the evils of the system ; 
after which I shall endeavor to prove the unlawfulness 
of it. Ishall then give a sketch of what has been done 
towards the abolition of Slavery; and close with an in- 
quiry as to the duty of British Christians with reference 
to this subject. 

The present lecture will comprise a view of the gen- 
eral character of Slavery, as it exists in the British Col- 
onies. I hope it will not be deemed superfluous if I 
commence by a few brief notices of the country from 
which, for ages, the Slaves have been imported, and 
of that which is the place of their hard servitude. 

Africa, which furnishes our colonies with Slaves, is 
a quarter of the globe which is considerably larger than 
Europe. It is, indeed, a vast peninsula to the south of 
Europe, connected with Asia by the Isthmus of Suez. 
The Mediterranean Sea is its northern boundary; on 
the east, the Arabian Gulf, or Red Sea, stretches contig- 
uously from the Isthmus of Suez to the Straits of Babel- 
mandel; from thence to the Cape of Good Hope, which 
is its southern extremity, the Indian Ocean washes its 
coasts; and from this point northward, to the Straits of 
Gibraltar, the Atlantic Ocean forms its western limit. 
Its figure is triangular, the base of which is its northern 
coast, and its vertex the Cape of Good Hope. From 
its most northerly cape, Bona, in the Mediterranean, 
which is in 37 deg. 10 min. N. Lat., to the Cape of 
Good Hope, in 34 deg. 29 min. S. Lat., the distance 
is about 4980 miles. From Cape Verd, its most west- 


22 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


erly point, in 17 deg. 33 min. W. Lon. to Cape Guar- 
dafui, in 51 deg. 20 min. E. Lon., the extent is about 
4790 miles. The far greater part of it, as you will per- 
ceive by the map, lies in the torrid zone. “ Those 
parts, however, that lie near the coasts, or in valleys, 
and on the banks of the rivers, are very fertile and pro- 
ductive ; and the country in general is capable of great 
improvement by cultivation. Its situation for commerce 
is preferable to that of any other quarter of the globe, as 
it has a more easy communication with Europe, Asia, 
and America, than either of these has with the rest.’’* 
A great portion of this vast continent was unknown to 
those ancient geographers whose works have come 
down to modern times. The Greeks and Romans 
knew but little ofthe interior: their information extend- 
ed principally to the northern states, with Egypt and 
Ethiopia to the east. If Africa now ranks low in civil- 
ization, and is considered the most degraded of the four 
quarters of the world, there was a time when she rank- 
ed high, and if not equal, was second only to Asia. 
Before imperial Rome was known even by name, 
Thebes the wealthy and the great was celebrated in Ho- 
meric song, and Memphis was renowned as first in pow- 
er and magnificence. When Greece was in a state of 
barbarism, Egypt shone unrivalled in the light and 
glory of science; its population was immense, and its 
wealth boundless. Nor was Ethiopia without a name. 
Ata later period Carthage, on the coasts of the Medi- 








* Rees’s Cyclop. art. Africa. 


LECTURE I. 23 


terranean, was, in riches and grandeur and power, the 
rival of Rome, and contended long with her for the great 
prize of universal empire. Other kingdoms and states 
of Northern Africa dared also, at different times, to enter 
into conflict with the mistress of the world. Atan early 
period Christianity was introduced into Africa, which 
gave birth to many of the fathers of the church, eminent 
for their learning and piety: Origen, Tertullian, Cypri- 
an, and Augustine, were all natives of Africa, which at 
one time numbered among its ecclesiastical officers sev- 
eral hundred bishops. And ata later period, when the 
dark ages almost threatened the extinction both of Chris- 
tianity and of human science, the Moors of Africa were 
distinguished for their superior learning and genius and 
gallantry. Since then Africa has gone back in civiliza- 
tion: a number of semi-barbarous states on the northern 
coasts, some of which extend even to the Great Desert, 
are subject to the Mohammedan power; but Egypt, 
which is still nominally dependent on the Grand Porte, 
seems rising of late into considerable importance, under 
its present intelligent and enterprising Pacha. 

One remarkable feature of this country is the immense 
Desert, which, extending from east to west, through 
nearly the whole of Africa, to the very borders of Egypt, 
in a breadth of eight or nine hundred miles, separates 
the northern states from the interior, and from those re- 
gions whence the Negroes are brought for sale to Ku- 
ropeans, South of the great desert is a vast tract of 
country called Negroland, or Nigritia, through which 
the river Niger runs; these names being evidently de- 


24 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


rived from the color of the inhabitants. The population 
of this part of Africa has never been correctly ascer- 
tained: it comprises a great variety of states and tribes, 
in very different degrees of civilization. It has for 
more than two centuries been annually drained of im- 
mense numbers of its inhabitants, to be exported as 
slaves to the opposite shores of the Atlantic. A long 
line of coast has been resorted to for this purpose, by 
European traders, extending from the river Senegal to 
the kingdom of Angola. But it is not only from places 
contiguous to the coast that the unhappy Negroes are 
drawn: they come sometimes from the very centre of 
Africa, a journey of many weeks, and even of months, 
to be transported to a distant land, there to wear out 
their lives in perpetual bondage. 

Let me now take you, not in the suffocating hold of 
a slave ship, but on the wings of fancy, from the shores 
of Africa, westward, across the Atlantic Ocean, to those 
islands which were the first fruits of discovery to the 
enterprise of Columbus, when the intelligence of a new 
world was announced to astonished Europe. It was on 
the 12th of October, 1492,* that this illustrious naviga- 
tor first beheld one of those islands now called the Ba- 
hamas, of which he took possession in the name of 
Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain, and gave to it the 
name of St. Salvador. Subsequently, and at. different 
intervals, the other islands, together with the great con- 
tinent of North and South America, were discovered. 
‘ 


” Robertson’s Hist. of America, book ii. 


LECTURE I. 25 


This great man had no idea that a vast continent inter- 
vened between the western shores of Europe and the 
eastern extremity of Asia, which then went by the gen- 
eral name of India. He supposed that by a western 
passage he had arrived at the Indian, or Asiatic islands, 
and that the continent was not far distant. These were 
therefore called the Indian Islands; and after the dis- 
covery of the new continent they were called the West 
Indies, Asiatic India acquiring the designation of the 
East Indies. The term West Indies now includes all 
those islands which extend from the Bahamas in the 
north, to Trinidad, near the coast of South America; 
and Honduras, Demerara, and Berbice, colonies on the 
adjacent continent, belonging to the British Crown, are 
also commonly comprised under this term. 

When the Europeans first visited these islands, they 
were believed by the simple inhabitants to have descend- 
ed from heaven: the scenes which this part of the world 
has since witnessed, have, to the lasting shame of hu- 
manity, lamentably proved the contrary. Nature, in 
these islands, appearing to the first discoverers in all 
her loveliness, adorned with every form of beauty, and 
exhibiting the richest fertility, at once astonished and 
delighted them ; but it is among the inscrutable myste- 
ries of Providence, that from the first period of their dis- 
covery they have continued to be the scenes of the most 
shocking depravity and heart-sickening misery. No 
sooner were they known than their original inhabitants 
became the victims of the sordid avarice and wanton 
barbarity of their intruders: their beautiful isles resound- 


26 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


ed with the cries of the tortured natives, and the earth 
was dyed with their blood. And since the period of 
these atrocious cruelties, by which the aborigines were 
soon exterminated, Africa has been stripped of her chil- 
dren to supply the waste, and to minister to the luxurie 
and to the insatiable cupidity of Europeans ;—the soil 
has been watered with their tears; the air has resound- 
ed with their groans; and thousands, and hundreds of 
thousands, nay, millions, have there worn out their lives 
in bitterest bondage. 

Besides the general appellation of West Indies, by 
which the whole of these islands are designated, they 
are also divided into the Greater and Lesser Antilles, 
the Caribbee Isles, and the Windward and Leeward 
Islands. These terms, however, have not been always 
uniformly applied, nor are they now in general use; so 
that it is less necessary to fix their respective limits. 
The largest of these islands is Cuba, belonging to Spain: 
its length is about 700 miles, its average breadth about 
70.—The next in size is St. Domingo, called by. the 
Spaniards Hispaniola, and by the natives Hayti. This 
is now a free and prosperous empire* of Blacks and 


* Great pains are taken by the pro-slavery party in this country 
to make it believed, that the experiment in Hayti has been un- 
successful, going to show, that colored men may not safely be en- 
trusted with their own government. But the fact that the Hay- 
tians have maintained their independence until now, and _pre- 
served a government at least as good as that of most of the white 
nations of the earth, should be enough to put their calumniators 
toshame. And when we consider the condition of the Island, 
after their struggles for independence—the general impoverish- 


LECTURE I. pad 


persons of color, who, after a desperate struggle against 
the legions of Bonaparte, secured, by force of arms, the 
personal freedom which had previously been granted to 
them by the French Convention, but which, in 1802, 
Bonaparte iniquitously attempted to wrest from them. 

4 The national independence ofthis Negro state has been 
since formally recognized by France.—Jamaica, the 
next in size, was formerly Spanish, but is now possessed 
by the English: its length is about 120 miles, and its 
average breadth about 40.—The smaller islands have 
been possessed as colonies by the Spaniards, the Eng- 
lish, the French, the Dutch, and the Danes; but the 
greater part of them now belong to the British Crown, 
partly by colonization, and partly by conquest.—Besides 
their produce for home consumption, their exports con- 
sist principally in sugar, rum, cotton, coffee, dye-woods, 
and some spices. 

In addition to the various islands in the West Indies 
belonging to Great Britain in which slavery prevails, 
there are three colonies on the adjacent continent of 
South America, (Demerara, Berbice, and Honduras,) 
and also the colonies of the Cape of Good Hope, and 
the Mauritius, (a small island in the Indian Ocean,) 


ment, the mental and moral degradation of the mass of the peo- 
ple, owing to the slavery in which they had been held, the entire 
derangement of public affairs incident to a revolution, and the 
dissimilar views of the leaders of the enterprise,—the marvel is 
that they have done so well; and the result proves any thing but 
‘that, which the opposers of Negro emancipation wish should be 
believed.— Am. Eb. 


28 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


where the bulk of the population are in the same un- 
happy state of bondage. 

Of these colonies,—twenty in all—six, viz. Berbice, 
the Cape of Good Hope, Demerara, Mauritius, St. Lucia, 
and Trinidad, are directly subject to the British Crown, 
and receive their laws from the King in council, through 
the medium of the local authorities appointed by him. 
These are termed Crown Colonies. The case of Hon- 
duras is anomalous. The other thirteen, which are 
called Chartered Colonies, have each a legislature of 
its own, consisting of a governor and council appointed 
by the King, and an assembly chosen by the White 
proprietors. These legislatures have the power of 
making laws, which are in force when approved by the 
governor, though not established permanently till they 
receive the assent of the King of Great Britain. The 
chartered colonies are, Antigua, Bahamas, Barbadoes, 
Bermuda, Dominica, Grenada, Jamaica, Montserrat, 
Nevis, St. Christopher's, St. Vincent's, Tobago, and 
Tortola. 

To avoid a lengthened description, I must now beg 
leave to refer toa tabular view, which is prefixed to 
this lecture, and which exhibits all the slave colonies of 
Great Britain, the time and manner of their first pos- 
session, by the British Crown, their extent, population, 
produce, &c. 


Let us now take a general view of the system itself, 
not at present to enter into a detail of its many enormi- 
ties—that we shall reserve for another occasion—but to 


LECTURE I. 29 


notice its principal circumstances, and to pourtray its 
more prominent features. Look, then, “with your 
mind’s eye,” on those beautiful islands already referred 
to. You see the population distinguished by their 
color. Here are white men, black men, and those who 
are partially tinged with the sable hue. None of them 
are the original inhabitants: these were long ago ex- 
terminated by men who called themselves Christians! 
Some have sprung from Europe, but the greater part 
from Africa. 'These White men, who bear themselves 
so haughtily, and who-appropriate to themselves all 
power, and all the luxuries which a tropical climate can 
yield, are either Europeans or the descendants of Eu- 
ropeans, who, for the love of enterprise, or in pursuit of 
gain, left their native shores in the different kingdoms 
and states of the old world——These blacks also are a 
race of foreigners, natives of Africa, or the children of 
Africans—Negroes, who came hither, not from motives 
either of enterprise or gain, but bound as prisoners, and 
sold, as so many head of cattle, to the highest bidder. 
—Those who by different shades have a less dark com- 
plexion, are called, generally, People of Color,* and are 


* Under this general term several distinctions are included, 
which, according to Mr. Edwards, in his History of the West In- 
dies, are thus specified :—The offspring of a 
Black Woman by a Mulatto Man, or vice versa, is a Sambo. 


Black Woman - - White Man - - - - -'!- a Maulatto. 
Mulatto Woman - White Man - - - - - - aQuadroon. 
Quadroon Woman White Man - - - - - a Mestize. 


The offspring of a Mestize by a White Man are White by law. 
—Creoles are those who, whether white or black, have been born 


in the colonies, 


30 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


the offspring of a mixed race. As the children of fe- 
male slaves are, by the colonial laws, born slaves, many 
of the children of the white lords of these islands have, 
by the vices of their parents, the miserable inheritance 
of slavery entailed on them; while this illicit intercourse 
has frequently produced the purchase of the freedom of 
such children by the white parent, or, in cases where 
the parent was also the owner, the gratuitous manumis- 
sion of both mothers and children. There are also 
considerable numbers of free Blacks in these Colonies, 
who have had their freedom bequeathed or given to them 
by humane proprietors, or who have found means to pur- 
chase it, or who are the descendants of those who had 
obtained their freedom in some of these ways. In all 
our slave colonies, the whole number of White inhab- 
itants is not supposed to exceed from 80 to 90,000; a 
considerably larger number are free Blacks and People 
of Color; but the great mass of the population, consist- 
ing of about 800,000, are enslaved Negroes. 

And this immense majority, whose misfortune it is to 
have a skin different in color from our own, are claimed 
as the property, and treated as the property, of their 
fellow-creatures! Inthe British slave colonies upwards 
of 800,000 are thus possessed by comparatively a few 
free men, chiefly Whites. But how was this property 
acquired? In the same way, in many instances, as you 
came by your cattle, your horses and dogs. You may 
have obtained them by bequest, or by inheritance; you 
may have purchased them together, as the live stock of 
an estate; or you may have selected them individually ; 


LECTURE I. ae 


or they may be the breeding produce of your stock. 
Just so was this property in human flesh acquired; and 
those who hold them insist on possessing them, as you 
do your cattle, male and female, till their last breath is 
drawn, unless they previously sell them to others: they 
claim an absolute right of property in them and theirs, 
not to the third and fourth generation, but forever ! 

But how came this kind of property to exist? How 
came this article of traffic inthe market? The planters 
tell you that they, or those from whom they received 
them, bought them honestly in the market.—But who 
brought them there? That merciless dealer in human 
flesh, the slave-captain—And where did he procure 
them? Of slave-merchants or agents on the African 
coast; and these, perhaps, of others in the interior.— 
But how were they first deprived of freedom? 'The 
greater part by wars excited for the express purpose of 
furnishing supplies for the slave-market, and receiving 
articles of commerce in return; by the burning of vil- 
lages and towns, in order to surprise the helpless fugi- 
tives; by false accusations, mock trials; by kidnapping 
some, by decoying others—in short, by every mode of 
force and fraud which an inhuman spirit of avarice 
could suggest.* 

Let us now glance at their situation and employment 
inthe colonies.t Someare employed as domestic slaves, 


* See “Cries of Africa,” by Mr. Clarkson; with “ Abstract of 
Evidence before a select Committee of the House of Commons, 
in 1790 and 1791,” chap. i. 


+ The description here given of the situation and employment 


32 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


when and how the owner pleases; by day or by night, 
on Sundays or other days, in any measure or degree, 
with any or with no remuneration, with what kind or 
quantity of food the owner of the human beast may 
choose. Male or female, young or old, weak-or strong, 
may be punished, with or without reason, as caprice or 
passion may prompt. When the drudge does not suit, 
he may be sold, like a horse that has seen his best days, 
for some inferior purpose, till like a worn-out beast he 
dies, unpitied and forgotten! In some cases slaves of 
this kind are purchased, not because their personal ser- 
vices are needed, but as a profitable speculation, to be 
let out to hire. Some, having had the opportunity to 
learn a trade, pay their owners a stipulated sum per 
week, or month, or otherwise, and have the surplus 
earnings for themselves ; with which, it may happen, if 
they are industrious, and have their health, and are suc- 
cessful, they may, in course of time, lay up a sum to 
purchase their‘own freedom, or that of a wife or child. 
But the owner may charge what he pleases for his 
time: if he be covetous, may screw him to the last 
farthing ; or, if he need money, may sell him to some 
distant part of the colony, to any other proprietor, who, 
again, may do with him just as he pleases. 

But the greatest number of these degraded beings are 
doomed to field labor, and that in a climate the heat of 
which is intense, and almost unremitted. Almost all 





of the West India slaves, prior to their emancipation in 1834, 
may give our readers a very correct idea of the condition of 
2,000,000 ofthe American People at this time.—Am. Ep. 


LECTURE I: 33 


the tillage of the soil, which in our agricultural pro- 
cesses we perform by horses and oxen assisted by ma- — 
chinery, is in the colonies carried on by the manual 
operations of the enslaved Negroes. The cultivation 
of cotton, coffee, sugar, indeed of all the productions of 
the plantations, devolves on them. It is the culture of 
the last-mentioned article, sugar, which appears to ex- 
pose them to the most toilsome drudgery and the severest 
treatment. While my plan does not allow of giving a 
particular description of every kind of produce which 
employs slave labor, I feel desirous that my audience 
should know in what manner that luxury of our tea- 
table and of our confectionary is raised. 

Sugar is the produce of a reed, or cane, the botanical 
name of which isarundo saccharifera. “It is a pointed 
reed,’ says Mr. Edwards,* “terminating in leaves or 
blades, whose edges are finely and sharply serrated. 
The body of the cane is strong, but brittle, and, when 
ripe, of a fine straw color inclinable to yellow; and it 
contains a soft, pithy substance, which affords a copious 
supply of juice, of a sweetness the least cloying and 
most agreeable in nature. The intermediate distance 
between each joint of the cane varies according to the 
nature of the soil: in general, it is from one to three 
inches in length, and from half an inch to an inch in 
diameter. The length of a whole cane depends like- 
wise upon circumstances: in strong lands richly ma- 
nured I have seen some that measured twelve feet from 


* Edwards’s History of the West Indies, book V. chap. i. 
3 


34 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


the stole to the upper joint: the general height, howev- 
er (the flag part exciuded,) is from three feet and a half 
to seven feet; and in very rich lands the stole or root 
has been known to put forth upwards of one hundred 
suckers, or shoots.”—The sugar-cane is propagated by 
cuttings; the most proper season of planting which, is, 
according to the same author, between August and the 
beginning of November; so that, as the canes are ordi- 
narily ripe in from twelve to fifteen months, they are fit 
for the mill in the beginning of the second year. “In 
most parts of the West Indies it is usual to hole and 
plant a certain proportion of the cane (commonly one 
third) in annual succession. ‘The common yielding of 
this land, on an average, is seven hogsheads of 16 cwt. 
to ten acres which are cut annually.”* The canes, 
when cut, are carried to the mill, which consists of 
strong rollers, through which the canes are passed, and 
which are worked by wind, water, cattle, or steam. By 
this means the juice is expressed, from which, after it 
has been clarified and has undergone various processes, 
the sugar is obtained. From the refuse, which is skim- 
med from the cane-juice, and the molasses, which are 
drained from the sugar, rum is produced by distillation. 

The first important operation in sugar planting, after 
the ground has been duly prepared, is that of holeing, 
which Mr. Edwards thus describes :—*“ The quantity of 
land intended to be planted, being cleared of weeds and 
other incumbrances, is first divided into several plats of 





* Rees’s Cyclop. art. Sugar. 


LECTURE I. 35 


certain dimensions, commonly from fifteen to twenty 
acres each: the spaces between each plat, or division, 
are left wide enough for roads, for the convenience of 
carting, and are called intervals. Each plat is then sub- 
divided, by means ofa line and wooden pegs, into small 
squares of about three feet anda half Sometimes, in- 
deed, the squares area foot larger; but this circum- 
stance makes but little difference. The Negroes are 
then placed in a row in the first line, one to a square, 
and directed to dig out with their hoes the several 
squares, commonly to the depth of five or six inches, 
The mould which is dug up being formed into a bank 
at the lower side, the excavation, or cane-hole, seldom 
exceeds fifteen inches in width at the bottom, and two 
feet anda halfat the top. The Negroes then fall back to 
the next line, and proceed as before.’’*—Into these holes, 
the cuttings are placed, and covered with mould; and 
as they grow, the earth is drawn around them, and the 
ground kept cleared of weeds. As vegetation proceeds, 
the joints increase in number, one growing out of anoth- 
er. A field of canes, when in full blossom, is said to be 
one of the most beautiful objects in nature. The field 
labor of the Negroes, when employed in holeing, is thus 
described by a gentleman of unimpeachable veracity, 
who spent many years in the West Indies.t 

“In holeing a cane-piece—i. e. in turning up the 


* Edwards’s Hist. of West Indies, book V. chap. 1. 


t‘*The Slavery of the British West India Colonies delinea- 
ted,” by J. Stephen, Esq. vol. I. App. p. 477; where. the state- 
ment here quoted is vindicated by unexceptionable references. 


. 


36 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


ground with hoes into parallel trenches, for the recep- 
tion of the cane-plants—the slaves, of both sexes, from 
twenty to fourscore in number, are drawn out in a line, 
like troops on a parade, each with a hoe in his hand, 
and close to them in the rear is stationed a driver, or 
several drivers, in number duly proportioned to that of 
the gang. Each of the drivers, who are always the 
most active and vigorous Negroes on the estate, has in 
his hand, or coiled round his neck, from which, by ex- 
tending the handle, it can be disengaged in a moment, 
a long, thick, and strongly plaited whip, called a cart- 
whip; the report of which is as loud, and the lash as 
severe, as those of the whips in common use with our 
wagoners; and which he has authority to apply at the 
instant when his eye perceives an occasion, without any 
previous warning. ‘Thus disposed, their work begins, 
and continues without interruption for acertain number 
of hours,* durmg which, at the peril of the drivers, an 
adequate portion of the land must be hoed, 

‘“ As the trenches are generally rectilinear, and the 
whole line of holers advance together, it is necessary 
that every hole or section of the trench should be fin- 
ished in equal time with the rest; and if any one or 
more Negroes were allowed to throw in the hoe with 
less rapidity or energy than their companions in other 
parts of the line, it is obvious that the work of the lat- 
ter must be suspended ; or else, such part of the trench 





* The hours of jield labor extend by law in Jamaica from five 
in the morning, to seven in the evening, with intervals of half an 
hour for breakfast, and two hours at noon. 


LECTURE I. 37 


as is passed over by the former will be more imperfect- 
ly formed than the rest. It is therefore the business of 
the drivers, not only to urge forward the whole gang 
with sufficient speed, but sedulously to watch that all im 
the line, whether male or female, old or young, strong 
or feeble, work as nearly as possible in equal time, and 
with equal effect. The tardy stroke must be quicken- 
ed, and the languid invigorated; and the whole line 
made to dress inthe military phrase as it advances. No 
breathing time, no resting on the hoe, no pause of lan- 
suor, to be repaid by brisker exertion on return to work, 
can be allowed to individuals. All must work or pause 
together. 

“T have taken this species of work as the strongest 
example. But other labors of the plantation are con- 
ducted on the same principle, and, as nearly as may be 
practicable, inthe same manner. 

“ When the nature of the work does not admit of the 
slaves being drawn up in a line abreast, they are dis- 
posed, when the measure is feasible, in some other reg- 
ular order for the facility of the driver’s superintendence 
and coercion. In carrying the canes, for instance, from 
the field to the mill,* they are marched in files, each 
with a bundle on his head, and with a driver in the 
rear: his voice quickens their pace, and his whip, when 
necessary, urges on those who attempt to deviate or loi- 
ter in their march.” 


* On most estates the canes are carried on the backs of mules, 
or in carts, from the field to the mill. 


38 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


As we shall often have, in the subsequent lectures, to 
refer to that terrible instrument of coercion and punish- 
ment, the cartwhip, let me here briefly describe its use 
and power. The quotation which [ shall make, is 
from the same work of Mr. Stephen, to which I have al- 
ready adverted.* 

“A long, thick, and strongly plaited whip, with a 
short handle, is coiled and slung like a sash over their 
shoulders (i. e. of the drivers,) except when extended 
in the hand for use, as the ensign of their fearful office ; 
and, being long trained to the expert use of it, they well 
know how to direct, and how to aggravate or mitigate 
its inflictions, at the will of their employers, or their 
own. They have an emulation in the loudness of the 
report which they produce from this instrument of tor- 
ture, the sound of which is enough to make the stout- 
est of its male patients tremble; and the smack of the 
cart-whip, frequently repeated from a distant cane-piece, 





* “The Slavery of the British West India Colonies delineat- 
ed,” vol. I. p. 49,50; where Mr. 8. has amply corroborated his ac- 
count of the whip by quotations from Mr. Beckford and Dr. Col- 
lins, both avowed apologists of colonial slavery; and from Dr. 
Pinckard, who has not in his work taken either side of the ques- 
tion. See Beckford’s “ Account of Jamaica,” vol. II. p.51; Dr. 
Pinckard’s “ Notes on the West Indies,” vol. L p. 257; and Dr. 
Collins’s “ Practical Rules for the Management and Treatment 
of Negro Slaves in the Sugar Colonies,” 1803, p. 209. ‘To which 
may be added the testimony of Mr. Barrett, whose language in 
the assembly of Jamaica was, “I do say, that 39 lashes with this 
horrid instrument can be made more grievous than 500 lashes 
with a cat.” He calls it also an “odious, horrid, detestable in- 
strument, when used for the punishment and torture of slaves ;” 
“an engine of cruelty,” &c. See extracts from his speech, in vol. 
I. pp. 306, 307, “ Anti-Slavery Reporter.” 


LECTURE I. 39 


serves often instead of a bell or conch-shell, to summon 
the Negroes from their huts at the earliest dawn to the 
theatre of their morning labors. The drivers, however, 
can, wher they please, in actual punishment, produce a 
loud report without proportionate severity of stripes; 
and, on the other hand, when told to cut, as the phrase 
is, they can easily inflict a gash at every stroke, so as to 
make even a few lashes a tremendous punishment. A 
planter, who valued himself on his humanity, once point- 
ed out to me a driver of his then passing by, as a man 
whose strength of arm and adroitness in the use of the 
whip were uncommonly great, and who had also a cru- 
el disposition. I once actually saw the fellow, said he, 
lay open the flank of a mule he was driving, cutting, 
fairly through its tough hide at a single stroke. He 
added, that he had him punished for it; and that it was 
his general injunction, to him and to other drivers, not 
to cut the Negroes in their whippings, upon pain of be- 
ing laid down and flogged themselves. Cutting does 
not merely mean drawing blood and peeling off the 
scarf-skin, for those are the effects of almost every stripe 
on the naked body with this instrument, however le- 
niently applied, but it means cutting through the cutis, 
or true skin, into the muscles or flesh below; and this 
is so usual in cart whippings, when regularly inflicted 
for a serious fault, that confinement to the hospital dur- 
ing the cure is an ordinary consequence, and large scars 
or weals remain during the life of the patient.* To be 


* Let not American readers console themselves with the sup- 
position that such cruelties, as are here described, are unknown. 


* 


40 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


exempt from such vestiges of severe punishment receiv- 
ed, is regarded as a distinction creditable to the charac- 
ter of a plantation slave, and enhancing his value toa 
purchaser.” 


How are the Negroes supported? In what manner 
do they live? ) 

In the Leeward Islands, comprising Antigua, St. 
Christopher's, Nevis, Montserrat, and Tortola, with a 
slave population of about 62,000, the slaves receive from 
their masters an allowance of food fixed by law; but so 
inadequate to the comfortable sustentation of life, that it 
does not amount to much more than a third of the 
stipulated allowance in the island of Jamaica to run- 
away slaves, or other delinquents, confined in the work- 
houses and prisons. This will appear from the fol- 
lowing comparison of the two scales of allowance: 


The weekly Legal Allowance of the Weekly Legal Allowance of Per- 
adult Laboring Slaves in the sons confined in the Prisons 


Leeward Islands. and Workhouses of Jamaica. 
9 Pints of unground corn, or 16 Pints of unground corn, or 
8 Pints of wheat or other flour, or 21 Pints of wheat or other flour, 
20 Pounds of yams, or or 
30 Pounds of plantains. 56 Pounds of yams, or 


56 Full-grown plantains, equal 

to about 75 to 80 pounds. 
The legal allowance of the Leeward Islands to working 
men, therefore, might easily be shown to be a starving 
allowance, being a little more than one-third of the al- 





in our country. They are as frequent in our Southern States as 
they were in the West Indies. Am. Ep. 


LECTURE I. Al 


lowance which is indispensable to the comfortable sub- 
sistence of the laborer. 

In Barbadoes, Demerara, and Berbice, the slaves are 
fed from provisions grown by the labor of the whole gang, 
and dealt out to them by the master, but without the le- 
gal limit by which the allowance ofthe Leeward Island 
slave is stinted to the smallest quantity by which his 
life can be sustained. But if there be no direct legal 
sanction in these three colonies for the same cruelly pe- 
nurious system in feeding the slaves which disgraces 
_ the legislature of the Leeward Islands, yet it is obvious, 

that to the discretion, or rather to the caprice or avarice 
of the owner alone, it is left to decide as to the quantity 
‘of food which shall be allowed to the slave for his sus- 
tentation and comfort; and neither in these three colo- 
nies, nor in the Leeward Islands, is a single hour allot- 
ted to the slave by law, which he can employ for eking 
out his scanty allowance, on any day except on Sunday. 

In all the other West India colonies the slaves have 

usually provision grounds allotted to them,* and a few 
days in the year, besides Sundays, assigned to them for 
laboring in these grounds for thetr sustenance;}+ the 
number of days varying in different colonies. In To- 
bago, it amounts to thirty-five; mm Jamaica the number 
is twenty-six; in Trinidad it amounts only to from four- 





*As Jamaica, Grenada, St. Vincent’s, Trinidad, Tobago, Dom- 
inica, St. Lucia, &c. 

+ These provision grounds are frequently at a considerable dis- 
tance from the homestall of the plantation; sometimes three, six, 
or even ten miles. See “ Facts illustrative of the Negro Slaves 
in Jamaica,” by T. Cooper, 1824, 


42 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


teen to seventeen ; and to about the same in the other 
colonies. On these, in addition to the Sundays, the 
Negroes raise vegetables for their own use; and the 
surplus, if any, they bring on Sundays to market, at a 
distance frequently of many miles, sometimes ten, twen- 
ty, or even thirty; the sale of which enables them to 
purchase a few trifling articles, either of food or appar- 
el. In addition, they are generally allowed a few salt 
herrings, or other fish, weekly; and they receive also 
annually from their masters a small quantity of clothing, 
the least and the cheapest that can possibly cover them. 
A few of the more industrious keep afew poultry, and 
perhaps a pig, which also become articles of traffic. And 
thus individual slaves sometimes succeed, by dint of ex- 
treme parsimony in acquiring a little property; by 
which, after a length of time, they are enabled to pur- 
chase their freedom. This, however, is a very rare 
occurrence indeed in the case of field slaves.—Their 
huts are built by themselves, often of very rude materi- 
als, but sometimes with materials furnished by their 
owners; andare generally, for the sake of convenience, 
near the buildings where the manufacture of sugar is 
conducted, though seldom with much regard to order 
in their position. 

Allow me now, in drawing the first lecture towards 
a close, to give a summary of the principal characteris- 
tics* of our colonial slavery as it existed in the colo- 


* We advise the reader to compare the summary here given, 
with the Digest or Sketch of American Slaves Laws, by George 


LECTURE I. 43 


nies prior to the year 1824, when measures were first 
taken for its mitigation. 

1. Perpetual bondage, to the last moment of the 
slave’s earthly existence, and to all his descendants to 
the latest posterity, unless the owner voluntarily relin- 
quished his claim. 

2. Compulsory and uncompensated labor. There 
was no covenant between him and his master; no stip- 
ulated remuneration for a certain quantity of labor; no 
hope of reward cheered him. In the house, a pure des- 
potism controlled him; in the field, the fear of the dri- 
ver’s lash was ever before him. 

3. The right of property was exercised over the Ne- 
gro slave. His owner claimed him as his goods and 
chattels. He might be sold by private sale or public 
auction ; individually, or “in lots to suit the purchaser ;” 
with his family, or separated forever from them. He 
might be exchanged for other marketable commodities ; 
might be mortgaged; might be taken in execution for 
debts or taxes. 

4. Very great obstructions existed to the manumission 

of the enslaved Negroes. Should aslave by any means 
happen to obtain a sum sufficient to purchase his free- 
dom, a heavy tax threw a formidable difficulty in the 
way, or a bond to a considerable amount was required ; 
which operated also powerfully against the bestowal of 
freedom by gift or bequest. In all the colonies, without 


M. Stroich, published in Philadelphia, 1824, that he may know 
how similar the Slavery here is to the Slavery that was in the 
West Indies.—Am., Ep. 


44 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


exception, it was entirely at the owner's option, whether 
he should part with his slave for any price. 

5. The Colonial bondman was liable, within certain 
limits, to severe and arbitrary punishment—without 
any trial; without any means of legal redress; wheth- 
er his offence were real or imaginary; by the owner, 
the attorney, the overseer, the manager, and the driver. 

6. Females were subject to the same degrading and 
severe punishments, and that in a manner as indecent* 
as it was cruel; not only at the order of the magistrate, 
but at the will of the master, or of any of his subordinate 
agents. , 

7. No legal rights of property were possessed by the 
slave: so that if by his industry, or the kindness of 
friends, he happened to obtain any, it was possessed, not 
as a matter of right, but by sufferance,t and was legally 
the property of his master. 

8. The sacred rite of Marriage, instituted by the 
Great Creator himself, was set at nought by this system. 
No legal sanction protected the slave in the enjoyment 
of conjugal rights; and promiscuous intercourse was 
not only permitted, but even encouraged, throughout the 
colonies, and more especially by the general example 
of licentiousness among the Whites themselves. 

9. The evidence of slaves was not admitted against 


* See Bickell’s ‘‘ West Indies,” pp. 48, 49. 


_ t See this illustrated, and the condition of the West India slave, 
in this respect, compared with that of the villein, when vassalage 
existed in England. Stephen’s “ Slavery of the Brit. W. Ind. 
Col. delineated,” vol. I. pp. 46, 47. 


LECTURE 1. 45 


a White or free man in a court of justice. He might 
give testimony against a fellow-slave, even in cases 
which affected his life; but when a white or free man 
was concerned, it was universally rejected. 

10. No means of any kind had been provided by law 
for the education and religrous instruction of the slave. 
While the master reaped the profits of his labor, till, 
worn out with toil, he sunk into the tomb, he had in 
almost all cases too much reason to say “ No man car- 
eth for my soul.” 

11. And, finally, the beneficent arrangements of the 
Creator, in providing one day in seven for bodily rest 
and holy worship, were frustrated, by the necessity of 
the poor slave's laioring for himself on that sacred day, 
and by the Sunday markets.* 





* “Tt (¢. e. Sunday) is the only market-day which the poor Ne- 
groes and Colored Slaves have; and instead of worshipping their 
God, they are either cultivating their portions of land to preserve 
life, or trudging like mules w ith heavy loads, five, ten, or even 
twenty miles, toa market, to sell the little surplus of their provis- 
ion-grounds, or to barter it for a little salt fish to season their poor 
meals; or, what is much worse, to spend, very often, the value in 
new destructive rum, which intoxicates them, and drowns for a 
short time the reflection that they are despised and burdened 
slaves. 

“T shall never forget the horror and disgust which I felt on go- 
ing on shore, for the first time in Kingston in the month of Au- 
gust, 1819: it was ona Sunday, and I had to pass by the Negro 
market, where several thousands of human beings, of various 
nations and color, but principally Negroes, instead of w orshipping 
their Maker on his Holy Day, were busily employed in all kinds 
of traffic in the open streets. Here were Jews, with shops and 
Standings as ata fair, selling old and new clothes, trinkets, and 
small wares at cent. per cent. to adorn the Negro person: there 
were low Frenchmen and Spaniards, and people of color, in 
petty shops and with stalls; some selling their bad rum, gin, to- 


46 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


To show that these were, what in too many respects 
they still are, the true and genuine features of the sys- 
tem, I need only to refer to the unanimous Resolutions 
of the House of Commons in May, 1823, when the sub- 
ject was formally brought before it by Mr. Buxton ; 
and to the sentiments of his Majesty's Ministers, ex- 
pressed in those Resolutions, which were proposed by 
themselves, and in their subsequent official correspond- 
ence with the colonial authorities. This testimony is 
the more remarkable, considering how great was the 
influence of the West-India body in Parliament, and 
how long and powerfully it had operated to shut out 
from public reprehension the wrongs and the actual 
miseries of hundreds of thousands of enslaved British 
subjects. On the motion of the late Mr. Canning, it 
was then unanimously resolved by the House of Com- 
mons, 

“Ist. That it is expedient to adopt effectual and deci- 
sive measures for meliorating the condition of the slave 
population in his Majesty’s dominions. . 

“2d, That, through a determined and persevering, 
but judicious and temperate, enforcement of such meas- 
ures, this House looks forward to a progressive im- 





bacco, &c., others salt provisions and small articles of dress, and 
many of them bartering with the slave, or purchasing his surplus 
provisions to retail again: poor free people and servants also, 
from all parts of the city, to purchase vegetables, &c., for the fol- 
lowing week. The different noises and barbarous’ tongues re- 
called to one’s memory the confusion of Babel; but the drunken-— 
ness of some, with the imprecations and obscenities of others, put © 
one in mind rather ofa Pandemonium, or residence of devils.”— 
“ The West Indiesas they are,” by Rev. R. Bickel , p- 66, 67.— 1825. | 


LECTURE I. 47 


provement in the character of the slave population; 
such as may prepare them for a participation in those 
civil rights and privileges which are enjoyed by other 
classes of his Majesty’s subjects. 

“3d. That this House is anxious for the accomplish- 
ment of this purpose at the earliest period that may be 
compatible with the well-being of the slaves, the safety 
of the colonies, and with a fair and equitable considera- 
tion of the interests of private property. 

“4th. That these resolutions be laid before his Ma- 
jesty.” 

These resolutions were subsequently adopted with 
the same unanimity by the House of Lords. 

Here, then, it was assumed, not only that his Britan- 
nic Majesty had slaves in his dominions, but that one 
class of his Majesty's subjects consisted of slaves ;—that 
such was the condition of the enslaved subjects of Brit- 
ain, as absolutely to require the “ decisive and effectual” 
interference of Parliament to relieve them ;—and that 
nothing but a “determined and persevering enforce- 
ment” of its humane intentions could rescue these un- 
happy beings from the?r miserable thraldom. 

In consequence of this measure on the part of the 
House of Commons, his Majesty's Government imme- 
diately proposed to introduce into our slave colonies the 
following reforms: 

To provide the means of religious instruction and 

Christian education for the slave population. 

To put an end to markets and to labor on the Sunday, 

and to appropriate that day entirely to rest and 


48 


po 


LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


recreation, and to religious worship and instruc- 
tion; and instead of Sunday, to allow them equiv- 
alent time on other days for the cultivation of their 
provision-grounds. 

To admit the testimony of slaves in courts of justice. 
To legalize the marriages of slaves, and to protect 
them in the enjoyment of their connubial rights. 
To protect the slaves by law in the acquisition and 
possession of property, and in its transmission by 

bequest or otherwise. 

To remove all the existing obstructions to manumis- 
sion, and to grant to the slave the power of re- 
deeming himself and his wife and children at a fair 
price. 

To prevent the separation of families by sale or oth- 
erwise. 

To prevent the seizure and sale of slaves detached 
from the estate or plantation to which they belong. 

To restrain generally the power, and to prevent the 
abuse, of arbitrary punishment at the will of the 
master. 

To abolish the degrading corporal punishment of fe- 
males. 

To abolish the use of the driving-whip in the field, 
either as an emblem of authority or as a stimulus 
to labor. 

To establish savings’ banks for the use of the slaves. 

These, then, were the measures of amelioration pro- 

sed by Government, and with the professed concur- 


rence of the West India body themselves who were resi- 


LECTURE 1. 49 


dent in England. And what point of oppression, or of 
degradation, which has been alleged of this system, is 
not here either admitted or implied? Does not the ap- 
plication of a remedy involve the admission of an evil? 
If, therefore, in charging these evils on the system its 
administrators conceived themselves to be libelled, they 
were libelled by the British Parliament, by the Govern- 
ment, by their own patrons and supporters. 

It may be necessary here to make two or three re- 
marks. The state of slavery varied somewhat in dif- 
ferent colonies. Their enactments and usages might 
bear upon the slave with more or less severity, accord- 
ing to circumstances: but, with specific distinctions, 
there was a general similitude in the law and the prac- 
tice of all our slave colonies. It is also admitted that 
the condition of the slaves may be considerably modified 
by the views and dispositions of the owners, if resident 
among them, or of the overseers or managers who exact 
and superintend their labors: some have more human- 
ity, more calmness and consideration, than others. It 
does not follow that every slave suffers all the evils to 
which his condition exposes him; but he is subject to 
all these miseries, and cannot help himself—many suf- 
fer them to the full, and all may. The Resolutions of 
1823, and the measures which followed them, have pro- 
duced some changes ; but small, indeed, has been the 
measure of improvernent. The promise they held out 
has yet produced little better than disappointment ; it 
has been a “hope deferred, which maketh the heart 
sick.’ ‘The boon which the Government of England 

4 


50 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


vouchsafed to ask of the colonial legislatures for these 
poor wretches has been contemptuously refused, or 
evaded ; or eked out in so scanty a manner, that next 
to nothing has hitherto been done; and even in the 
Crown colonies Government has fallen far short of its 
pledges. The particulars we shall reserve for a future 
occasion, and only here remark, that the great mass of 
evil still remains in undiminished malignity. 

What a strange and afflicting state of society is here 
presented to our view! And that, not in the dark ages 
of ignorance and barbarity, but in the Nineteenth cen- 
tury, amidst the wide diffusion of knowledge, the numer- 
ous and ever-increasing plans of benevolence, and the 
strong professions of liberality, which mark the present 
age! Such usages existing, not among hordes of sav- 
ages, but among men, civilized, enlightened, and calling 
themselves Christians! Found, not in the territories of 
some despotic tyrant, but in the dominions of Britain, 
whose boasted glory is the freedom of her constitution, 
the liberty of her subjects, the wise and just adminis- 
tration of her laws, the equal rights of all! <A state of 
society so foreign to all we have ever seen, or can con- 
ceive of, that it is difficult for one who has a British 
heart, with a British education, to realize or even to be- 
lieve it. And we could not have believed it, we would 
not have believed such libels on our common nature, 
but for the irresistible evidence of its existence. 

Happy for us, we are natives of Britain, and live in 
the land of freedom: we see no such sights, we hear no 


such sounds. The West Indies may shine in nature’s — 


| 
| 
| 





LECTURE I. 5l 


glory; may boast of scenery which is enchanting, fruits 
the most exquisite, and a soil which is fertility itself; 
but give me England—though rugged be its coasts, and 
changeful its climate; though, while a summe?’s splen- 
dor shines on these colonies, our streams are stagnant 
with ice, and our fields covered with snow. Snow, and 
ice, and vapors may exist here—but Slaverycannot. I 
had rather hear the wintry blast than the sound of the 
driver’s whip, or the groans of the lacerated slave. I 
had rather see the drifting snow covering every thing 
that is green, than the luxuriant cane-field with its gang 
of slaves, and the torturer behind them. Here one law 
is for all; the rich and the poor, the master and the ser- 
vant. No man can possess as property, or buy, or sell, 
or barter, a fellow-creature: no human being is ap- 
praised, put up to auction, seized for another’s debts, or 
sold for taxes. None can take our children from us. 
Our wives and daughters are not exposed to brutal in- 
sults or degrading punishments: in our homes they 
find an asylum; and not a noble in the land can touch 
them there, nor dares even the Sovereign to injure them. 
Our offspring inherit, not our chains, but our freedom. 
We peaceably pursue, according to our inclinations and 
duties, the various occupations of life; and the law 
throws over us the shelter of its protection.* We “sit 


* How little of the honest exultation of our author over old 
England, can we utter over New England! Human beings may 
here be seized as slaves! A southern man may come and claim 
them as his property, make use of owr magistrates and constables 
to obtain possession of them, and of owr jails to keep them safely 


UNIVERSITY OF 
ILLINOIS LIBRARY, 


52 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


under our own vine and under our own fig-tree, none 
daring to make us afraid.” ; 

But in the enjoyment of all this comfort, this peace, 
this freedom, do you not hear the sighs of the slave 
wafted over the Atlantic? Do not the groans of his 
misery reach your heart? Is he not saying, “ Pity me, 
O my friends, for the hand of the oppressor is upon me! 
Pity me, your fellow-subject, O ye who boast of liberty, 
and whose benevolence reaches even to the ends of the 
earth. Pity me, ye British Christians; for ye only can 
relieve me. Am I not a man, and a brother?” 


until he can remove them. Nor is this all, our free colored pop- 
ulation, as they are called, are liable to be kidnapped here, and 
cannot, at the peril of their liberty, venture beyond the boundaries 
of what are called the “ Free States.” —Am. Ep. 


LECTURE II. 


How emphatic is the expression which a sacred 
writer employs when speaking of the state in which we 
live! He calls it, “this present evil world,” This term 
is not applied to the globe which we inhabit: it is ever 
obedient to the laws by which the great Creator governs 
it, and completely answers the end for which it was 
made. On its surface are a thousand forms of beauty 
and of grandeur. Its productions are such as minister 
not only to the necessities, but to the convenience and 
happiness, of man, and of every inferior creature made 
to exist upon it. Its hills and its valleys, its springs and 
rivers, the ocean that washes its shores, and the atmos- 
phere which surrounds it—the whole is good, and was 
at its creation pronounced “very good.’ But innu- 
merable are the evils which swarm upon its surface, 
and intermingle themselves with human society. There 
is, in this probationary state, much evil which is una- 
voidable. ‘The present is, more or less, a state of suffer- 
ing to all. But by far the greatest portion, and the 


54 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


. 


worst of the evils, are of man’sown making. Too often 
does man become the scourge, the oppressor, the tor- 
mentor of man; and, in addition to the miseries incident 
to frail humanity, creates a large mass of supernume- 
rary and unnecessary evil. Perhaps there are but few 
objects which exhibit this more strongly than slavery ; 
the slavery which prevails in the colonies of Great Brit- 
ain and of other European Powers, and which scarce- 
ly finds a parallel amongst the most barbarous nations. 

From the view already given of the state of our colo- 
nies, and the features of this odious system which have 
been already described, its enormous evils must be ap- 
parent; but it is not, I conceive, superfluous to take a 
mote particular survey of it. While most acknowledge 
that it is an evil generally, few, I imagine, think of its 
many ramifications. Let us now, therefore, notice its 
stupendous and varied powers of mischief. 

And let me earnestly entreat my readers not to shrink 
from this survey because the picture is revolting; let 
them not turn away from the view because it is dis- 
tressing to the feelings. Why was our nature endowed 
with sensibilities which are pained at the sight of mise- 
ry, but that they should prompt us to succor and relieve 
the wretched? It is a wise and merciful ordination of 
Providence, not to trust the help of the miserable solely 
to our judgment. This is too cold and slow in its deci- 
sions: while we deliberate, a wretch may perish. But 
this sympathetic pain is an inward impulse, a powerful 
instinct, urging us to assist the helpless, to succor the 
weak, to relieve the wretched, if we would avoid being 
miserable ourselves. Ought we to shut our eyes to the 


LECTURE III. 55 


agonizing struggle of a drowning man, if there be the 
most distant possibility of helping him, lest, forsooth, we 
should be pained at the sight, and be at the trouble of 
attempting his rescue? 

There are some persons who affect to disbelieve all 
that is said of the misery of the Negro slave, and who 
boldly contradict the descriptions of the wretchedness of 
his condition which have been given by those who ad- 
vocate his freedom. The laws, they tell us, may be 
somewhat severe in their letter, but the spirit of their 
administration is mild-and benignant. All that formerly 
had the appearance of rigor or cruelty is now become 
obsolete. And sometimes they affect to treat with con- 
tempt the ignorance, and at other times they are filled 
with a virtuous indignation at the falsehood, of those 
who affirm that the slaves are in a condition the most 
degraded and unhappy.—Nor is this to be wondered 
at, when we consider the numbers who are interested 
in the continuance of this system, the agency which is 
employed, and the sums which are expended to prevent 
the public from calling for Parliamentary interference. 
I shall, however, advance nothing but what I conscien- 
tiously believe to be true. The facts will be drawn 
principally from official documents laid before Parlia- 
ment, and from the statements and admissions of those 
who are planters, or who are friendly to the system: in 
all cases I shall give my authority, and leave you to 
_ judge both of the credibility of the statements and the 
conclusions which I draw from them. 

Far be it from me to wish to excite hostility against 
any body of men: there is not the individual upon earth 


56 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


that I would willingly injure “in mind, body, or estate.” 
I have no resentments to gratify in this matter: I have 
no interests but those of humanity to seek. It is the 
measures which Icondemn—the system which I depre- 
cate. 

Our colonial slavery exhibits so many evils of so 
many different kinds, they are so varied and complex, 
that I scarcely know where to begin. It affects not 
only Africa, but America; it reaches even to Europe 
and Asia. Its dark shadows are stretched over black 
men and white, the slave and the slave-holder: it com- 
prehends almost every kind of sin, and nearly every 
form and degree of suffering. I shall therefore classify 
these evils, and consider them under three general 
heads—natural, moral and political. 

By natural evil, I mean misery, suffering of every 
kind. Whatever evil attends this system, affecting man 
in his physical constitution, his intellectual powers, his 
relation to his fellow-creatures—whatever makes the 
slave a sufferer—lI include under this general head. 

Let it be remembered, that the 800,000 * slaves now 
in our colonies were either brought from Africa, or are 
the children or descendants of those who were so 
brought. By the abolition of the slave trade, no slave 
was allowed to be imported into our colonies from the 
ist of March, 1808; but as a great part of the Negroes 
were young when introduced, there must be still many 
surviving who were torn from their native land. 


* The number in the United States is probably more than 2,500,- 
000 at the present time.—Am. Ep. 


LECTURE II. 57 


Here, then, we should begin. And were we now to 
detail all the heart-rending miseries of their first cap- 
ture, and the horrifying circumstances of the middle 
passage,* which the investigations of Parliament brought 
to light, and which have long been before the public, 
we should, indeed, have to tell such a tale of woe as 
scarcely finds a parallel in the annals of human suffer- 
ing. But we shall not harrow up your feelings by a 
relation of all the cold-blooded atrocities of barbarous 
chiefs, and piratical bands, and private adventurers, and 
kidnappers, and agents, and slave-merchants, and slave- 
captains. We shall not attempt a description of the 
midnight horrors of villages attacked, and the escape of 
the trembling fugitives from the flames, to fall into the 
hands of the traders in human flesh. We shall pass 
by the dreadful separation, in such circumstances, of 
husband and wife, parent and child—their passage over 
mountains and through deserts, chained together like 
convicts—their agonizing reflections and terrible antici- 
pations—their situation when jammed by hundreds, like 
bales of goods, between the low decks of their floating 
dungeon—the putrid air, the stench, the filth, and the 
diseases which were thus generated—the silent despair, 
the frantic madness, the self-murders, the lingering 
deaths, the wretches thrown overboard alive ;—the vari- 
ous causes which destroyed about a fourth or fifth part 
of this living cargo during the passage. The unutter- 


* The technical term for the voyage from the African coast to 
the West Indies. 


58 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


able, inconceivable sufferings of these poor wretches, , 
from their first seizure till their sale in the colonies, we 
shall not dwell upon; not because the introduction of 
them in this place would be improper or irrelevant, but 
because we do not wish to repeat such horrors, which 
have been so long before the public, and to which ref- 
erence has so often been made. 

If it be asked, why they should be at all noticed, 
since Parliament has abolished this trade ? we reply, 
in the first place, because they form a part and parcel 
of the system; and because, while this country retains 
in slavery the victims of its former rapine, it encouragés 
other nations to connive at the continuance of the trade. 
Besides, it was slavery which originated the slave trade 
and all its abominations. It is no wonder that those 
who advocate the continuance of slavery feel sore on 
this point, and manifest the utmost anxiety that the hor- 
rible cruelties attendant on the procuring of their slaves 
should be forgotten. They never will, they never can, 
be forgotten, while slavery exists; nor, in estimating the 
amount of evil which this system has produced, must 
they ever be omitted.—Because, secondly, as we have 
already noticed, numbers still survive in our colonies 
who were the subjects of these atrocious cruelties. Par- 
liament has branded with disgrace, and now visits with 
death, the practice to which they fell victims; it has 
pronounced the slave trade to be piracy: but what com- 
pensation could this Act afford to those who had been 
thus wickedly torn from their native land, and sold into 
hopeless bondage? And, thirdly, in order to shew the 


LECTURE II. 59 


obligations we are under to make all the reparation 
that can be made to the surviving slaves. If men’s 
rights are entailed by hereditary descent, are not also 
their wrongs? If those who are now born with the yoke 
of slavery on their necks, are in that condition only be- 
cause their fathers were wickedly enslaved, are they 
not the representatives of the injuries which their pa- 
rents suffered from white men, under the consequences 
of which they themselves now groan? We can give 
no indemnification to the myriads, who, torn from their 
native Africa, have died in slavery: we owe it all, and 
we owe it with interest, tothe surviving slaves.—Let us 
proceed to take a brief view of the sufferings to which 
their present condition exposes them. 

That it is a state of severe distress and cruel suffering 
to the African, must be evident from this one fact, that, 
during the time of “seasoning,” as it is called, many 
thousands died. This period was considered to be of 
the duration of two or three years; and such was the 
oppressive severity of their new condition, that, added 
to the effect of their grief, no small portion of these un- 
happy beings sunk under it, and thus escaped a pro- 
longation of their miseries. 

Let us first advert to their general treatment. Under 
this head I include their /ador, their mode of living, and 
the punishments to which they are liable. 

Whatever be their situation, predial or domestic, their 
labor is entirely forced, and not voluntary. The only 
limits of a slave’s labor, are his own physical capabili- 


60 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


ties and his owner’s will.* The only problem for the 
slave proprietor to solve is, how much can he gain by 
his article; what is the greatest possible amount which 
he can extract from all, male and female, old and young, 
consistently with his own interests. Ifan extra portion 
of labor during a short time be considered, as it often 
may be, more advantageous than more moderate labor 
during a longer period, interest will, in most cases, 
prefer the increased gain to the slave’s comfort, or even 
life. And terrible indeed must be the condition of the 
slaves, when a planter is either struggling with his 
sinking fortunes, and ready to make the most desperate 
efforts to protract the period of his ruin; or is desirous 
to take advantage of a great rise in the price of the com- 
modity which he cultivates, in order to increase his 
gains. Is it likely that in such circumstances he will 
be very scrupulous about over-working his human cat- 
tle? Failures in planting speculations are more com- 
mon than in perhaps any department of trade or com- 
merce, and they often either originate in the waste of 
Negro life, or directly lead to it. 

In respect to field labor,t one of the clauses of the Ja- 


* The colonial laws have, indeed, sometimes regulated the 
hours of field labor, but in their regulations they have obviously 
proceeded on the principle of exacting the maximum of which 
the slave is capable. 

+In the slave States in the United States, the time of labor 
of the slaves is 15 hours from March to September, and 14 
from September to March, allowing them half an hour for break- 
fast, and two hours for dinner. As however the testimony of the 


LECTURE II. 61 


maica Slave Law provides that the slaves shall not be 
compelled to work in the field before five in the morn- 
ing, nor after seven in the evening; and that they shall 
have half an hour for breakfast, and two hours for din- 
ner.* The Rey. Richard Bickell, who was for some 
time curate of Port Royal, says that the slaves “are 
generally summoned from their slumbers by the crack- 
ing of the driver’s whip, about half an hour before day- 
light.”t Mr. De la Beche, the proprietor of a sugar 
estate in Jamaica, in his account of the island, mentions 
from five to seven one half of the year, and from half 
past five to half past six the other half, as the hours of 
labor.—But this is not all; as it is well known that, 
after the labor of the field is ended, the Negroes on 
most of the plantations are compelled to collect grass 
for the horses and cattle, from the hedge-rows, and 
wherever it may be found, and to bring to the homestall 
each a bundle. It cannot therefore be supposed that 
it is before eight or nine at night, perhaps not so soon, 
that the poor Negro, jaded and exhausted, gets home to 


slave is excluded from Courts of Justice in all cases where a 
white man is a party in the suit, if the law respecting the time of 
labor should be violated by a longer period being required than 
15hours, it would be almost impossible to prove the fact. Besides, 
the slave knows nothing probably about the law, or even if he 
did, would he hazard the chance of being subjected to severe 
punishment and privations by making a complaint against his 
master.—-Am. Ep. 

* See Colonial Acts of Jamaica, St. Vincent’s, Grenada, &c. . 


1 P. 47, ‘““ West Indies as they are,” 


62 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


his hut, then to cook and eat his evening’s meal; and 
after a brief repose to be summoned again to the field. 
In this daily toil it must be remembered that he works 
under the constant impulse of the whip, or the dread of 
it; that females are equally compelled to this drudgery, 
and the weak as well as the strong. Nor is it likely 
that in such cases the drivers or managers would be 
very forward to admit the plea of weakness, or of indis- 
position; on the contrary, they naturally lean to the 
side of suspecting that the plea is a fictitious one, fram- 
ed to escape labor. Does not Major Moody himself, 
one of the ablest advocates of the planters and their sys- 
tem, admit the excessive toil of field slaves, when he 
contends that nothing but constant coercion can produce 
this labor? 

But the severity of their toil is greatly increased dur- 
ing a considerable part of the year. In crop-time (va- 
rying in its duration from four to five or six months) the 
law places no limit to the hours of labor, except that it 
interdicts the sugar-mill on Sundays; but even this pro- 
vision for rest on the Sabbath, there is too much reason 
to believe, is not always observed. The Rev. Mr. 
Bickell says, that “the crop-time generally lasts from 
Christmas to June or July.” The Rev. Mr. Cooper 
states that where he was situated it continued five 
months; and that “the plan that was followed on 
Georgia estate, was to begin the manufacture of sugar 
on Sunday evening, and to continue it, generally with- 
out intermission, either day or night, till about mid- 
night the following Saturday; when the work stops 


LECTURE II. 63 


for about eighteen or twenty hours, to commence again 
on the Sunday evening. In order to prevent any in- 
‘terruption of this process during the week, the slaves 
capable of labor are, with some necessary exceptions, 
divided into two gangs, or spells, which, besides being 
both fully occupied in the various occupations of the 
plantation during the day, are engaged the whole of the 
mght, on alternate nights, in the business of sugar 
making.* Their labor during crop-time is thus equal 
to six days and three nights in the week. And in the 
exaction of this labor no distinction is made between 
men and women: both are subject to the same unvary- 
ing rule.t In some cases, it appears, that, instead of 
working the whole of alternate nights during crop-time, 
they work the half of every night. Can it excite sur- 
prise, that, with such labor as this, the mortality among 
the slaves is suchas to be continually diminishing their 
‘number ? 

Nor are the slaves exempt from considerable hard- 
ships as to their food and manner of living.t—Can it 
be supposed, that, in addition to the vegetables of his 
own raising, a few herrings weekly, or two pounds of 
salt fish, are sufficient to sustain a man under all this 





* The same practice is said to prevail in Louisiana in crop- 
time.— Am. Ep. 

t “ Negro Slavery,” p. 48. 

+t The law of Louisiana provides that the slave shall have for 
food, one pint of salt, and a barrel of Indian corn, rice or beans 
every month. In North Carolinaa quart of corn per day is deem- 
ed sufficient—Am. Ep. 


64 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


labor in the open air in such a climate? Besides, after 
the fatigue of what is equal to six days and three nights 
of labor in the week, during crop-time, will not many a 
slave be inclined to enjoy a little rest for his wearied 
frame, on the only day on which he can cease from toil, 
even to the neglect of his provision grounds, which may 
be several miles distant 2 And, indeed, what alternative 
can there be, throughout the whole of the year, but that 
of either laboring for himself on the day of rest, or liv- 
ing on short allowance? I have already shown you, 
that in some of the colonies, where they have not pro- 
vision grounds, the quantity of food prescribed by law 
is not equal to the jail allowance of Jamaica. And as 
to these legal allowances, Mr. Stephen has, in his “ De- 
lineation of the Slavery of the West Indies,” adduced 
undeniable proof that they are in many, if not in most 
cases, but a dead letter.* In the petitions of 1811, and 
1823, the Assembly of Jamaica—and what can be high- 
er authority for the fact 1—declare, that, owing to the 
general distress of the planters, their slaves are in dan- 
ger of “absolute want;” that they cannot give to them 
their usual “comforts” and “ remuneration ’—(what 
these usual comforts and remuneration are, we have 
already seen ;)—and therefore they apprehend, from 
their “rage and despair,’ a general revolution. That 
is, that their half-famished slaves will rise on them, 
through the miseries of starvation. Who, of all the 
friends of abolition, ever gave a stronger representation 





* Pp. 99, 100. 


LECTURE II. 65 


than this, supposing it to be true, of the miseries to 
which the slave population are liable through a defi- 
ciency of food and other comforts? For how should 
this be, if the masters did not withhold from their slaves 
the time necessary for raising food? 

There are, no doubt, attorneys, overseers, and man- 
agers, whose humanity, though not personally interest- 
ed in the welfare of the slaves, may induce them to treat 
the infirm and diseased with kindness; yet what must 
become of the weak and sickly when this is not the 
case? Dr. Williamson, who lived for some years in 
Jamaica, on an estate of the Earl of Harewood, with 
reference to the labor of the healthy being imposed on 
those who are weakly and unable to bear it, observes, 
that “ it is too true that due consideration is not some- 
times given to this point.” * The same author also af- 
fords proof, that, whatever may be the humane intentions 
of proprietors, the inconsiderate, not to say inhuman, 
conduct of those who have the management of the slaves, 
sometimes occasions increased illness to the sickly Ne- 
gro, and even loss of life. 

The punishments to which they are ever subject, form 
a terrible item in the catalogue of the slaves’ miseries. 
I do not here mean punishments inflicted by magisterial 
authority, but those to which they are lable from their 
task-masters, at their mere caprice, without any trial, and 
for any or for no offence. ‘The owner has an almost 


* “ Medical and Miscellaneous Observations relative to the 
West India Islands,” vol. ii. p, 223. 


5 


66 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


unlimited power of punishment* over his slaves, both 
male and female. Till of late years, indeed, the killing 
or dismemberment of a slave, by his owner, was in sey- 
eral of the colonies either not punished at all, or bya 
small fine, or short imprisonment. The number of 
lashes has been reduced in a few instances, but in gen- 
eral it is limited by law to thirty-nine ¢ by the owner or 
manager, and to a less number by the driver. Even in 
the boasted Acts of amelioration, which profess to re- 
strain the masters’ power of arbitrary punishment, there 
are terms introduced which render the whole nugatory, 
or nearly so; such as, “on the same day”—*“ for the 
same fault’’—‘ at the same time’’—or “until the slave 
shall have recovered from the effects of any former pun- 
ishment.” 

But, besides this power of the owner or manager, for 
the employment of which no one hasa right to call him 
to account; the driver possesses also the power of sum- 
mary punishment, and, besides the presence and actual 
infliction of the lash as a mere stimulus to exertion, as 
a waggoner stimulates the horses of his team, not un- 


* The punishment which may be inflicted in the slave states 
in the United States may be said to depend upon the caprice or 
will of the master or overseer. ‘The mode of punishment, and 
the number of stripes is in some cases fixed by law, but the ex- 
clusion of slave testimony, and the fear on the part of the slave of 
making complaint against the overseer would render such laws 
a dead letter—Awm. Ep. 

+ A member of the Jamaica legislature declared, as we have 


already noticed, that thirty-nine lashes with the whip can be made 
more grievous than five hundred with the cat. 


LECTURE II, 67 


frequently exercises that power. If the Negroes are 
late in the field in the morning, or after dinner, he may 
inflict the lash, within certain limits, on their bare bod- 
ies, whether they be men or women.* If they flag in 
their work, through idleness, or weakness, or fatigue, 
the driving whip may be employed to quicken them. 
Dr. Collins, who was himself a planter, says that “ it is 
generally bestowed with rigor on the weakest of the 
gang, and those who are so unfortunate as not to be in 
favor with this sub-despot.”t “ If any offend more than 
ordinarily, Master Driver, who has almost unlimited 
power, takes him or her from the ranks, and, having 
two or three strong Negroes to hold the culprit down, 
lays on lashes with all his might. Thirty-nine is the 
number specified by law, beyond which even a white 
man cannot legally go in one day ;” (and ten the num- 
ber a driver may inflict by his own authority;) “but I 
have seen a black driver lay on, most unmercifully, up- 
wards of forty at one time, whilst his fellow-slave was 
erying out for mercy, so that he could be heard a quar- 
ter of a mile from the spot.” { And no wonder that 
such would be his cries, since Mr. Cooper, in the work 
already referred to, says that ‘each lash, when the skin 
is tender, and not rendered callous by repeated punish- 
ments, makes an incision on the parts to which it is ap- 
plied, and thirty or forty such lashes leave them ina 





* See testimony of the Rev. T. Cooper, ‘‘ Negro Slavery,” p. 60. 
+ Quoted by Mr. Stephen in the work before mentioned, p. 53. 
t Rev. R. Bickell, ut sup. p. 18. 


68 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


dreadfully lacerated and bleeding state. Even those 
that have become the most callous cannot long resist the 
force of this terrible instrument, when applied by a 
skilful hand, but become also raw and bloody: indeed, 
no strength of skin can withstand its reiterated applica- 
tion.” * Dr. Williamson, already quoted, who was an 
advocate for the colonial system, observes to the same 
effect: “If, in a warm day, we pass by a gang when 
they are uncovered behind, it is a reproach to every 
white man to observe in them the recently lacerated 
sores, or the deep furrows which, though healed up, 
leave the marks of cruel punishment.” ¢ If it were 
necessary, many other testimonies might be adduced to 
the same purpose. 

Besides this mode of punishment, there are stocks on 
the estate, in which, at the pleasure of the overseers or 
managers, the slaves are put for any length of time; 
frequently working by day with the gang in the field, 
and being confined in the stocks all night. They may 
also be sent, without any order of a magistrate, to the 
workhouse, or jail; and there ordered, besides being 
worked in pairs chained together by the neck during 
the period of their confinement, to receive thirty-nine 
lashes at their going inand attheircoming out. Some- 
times a whole gang may be seen thus fastened together, 
witha driver attending them. Such power can scarcely 
fail of being abused to cruel purposes; and many affect- 
ing instances of this kind might be adduced, to corrobo- 


* P. 61. t Referred to in ‘‘ Negro Slavery,” p. 83. 


LECTURE II. 69 


rate those narrated by Mr. Cooper in pp. 63, 64, of the 
work from which we have already made quotations. 

We shall now call as a witness, an officer of one of 
the colonies appointed for the protection of the slaves, 
but not having, apparently, any very favorable leaning 
towards them. Let the Fiscal of Berbice step forward. 
—The following extracts are [from the minutes of this 
officer ; which were laid before the House of Commons, 
and ordered to be printed by them the 23d of June, 
1825. The papers are official, and the facts recent. 

“ Complaint of the woman Minkie, belonging to 
Thomas C. Jones :—Says, Mr. Jones took her out ofthe 
barracks on Tuesday; after I got home he sent me to 
Mr. Henry; he would not buy me. He sent me to 
another gentleman; I do not know his name, but he 
lives in town; they both said my master asked too 
much money for me, and sent me back. I begged for 
a pass to look for an owner; he said no, he would put 
me down and cut me,* and would give me more than the 
law gives. I was then laid down, and tied to three 
stakes, and Chance flogged me witha cart-whip; I got 
a severe flogging; I saw Mr. Layfield at his door with 
another gentleman; and Mr. Kerschner, the baker, 
saw it from his window, Mr. Jones bought me from 
Mr. Logie, of Demerara. I have marks of severe pun- 
ishment visible on me, old and recent floggings, all in- 
flicted by Jones. 

“Exhibits the wounded parts,* which are covered 


* Other words are here substituted for the expressions in the 
Fiscal’s report, for decency’s sake, 


70 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


with a plaister, by order of the doctor, and apparently 
lacerated to that degree that the court judged it expedi- 
ent to direct her not to uncover it. 

“Mr. Jones said he had flogged her, and broke her 
mouth for her insolence. He had thirty-nine laid on 
her, and they were well inflicted. When he sent for 
her, he had no intention of flogging her; but after send- 
ing her to three persons for sale, and not succeeding, 
he told her, she had often deserved a flogging; he then 
directed her to be flogged, and that they should be well 
laid on, which was done.” c 

What an affecting instance is this of the miseries * 
to which those unhappy beings are subject, who are so 
entirely at the mercy of haughty, capricious, or passion- 
ate owners! Here is a female whose body is lacerated 
to that degree that the court could not endure to behold 
it; and for what dreadful crime? ‘The author of this 
cruelty does not even pretend that there was any, or 
that it was necessary that any charge of guilt should 
be substantiated to justify the infliction of these lacera- 
tions on a helpless female: he does not hesitate to de- 
clare that they were at his order “ well inflicted; and 
that he had done more than she complained of, he had 


* Numerous instances of atrocious barbarities committed upon: 
Slaves in the Southern States, are given by authors upon this 
subject. It is almost the necessary result of Slavery—the sub- 
jection of one race of men to the irresponsible control of another, 
who are led to consider them as brutes, as faras suffering is to 
be inflicted upon them, but as men so far as_they are to be held 
accountable for their conduct.—Am. Ep. 


LECTURE II. whe] 


“broken her mouth ”’—and why ? because he had sent 
her, being probably in want of money, to three persons 
for sale, who did not choose to take his offer! And this 
is the way Mr. Jones takes to soothe his irritation. 
But when he beholds what he has done in cold blood, 
he has no visitings of compunction; he seems actually 
to glory in it, and to look with haughty and indignant 
scorn on any appearance of interference! And what 
could these magistrates do to help this wretched female ? 
There was no evidence to show that her master had 
gone beyond the number of stripes which the law then 
allowed.* She must again return, and be com- 
pletely in the power of the same ruthless and vindictive 
being, with the recollection on his mind that she had 
dared to call him before a magistrate—We do not say 
that all actually receive this treatment, but this is the 
treatment to which all are subject, and without any vi- 
olation of colonial law. 

The following case also deserves notice: it is taken 
from the same official report.—Mrs. Saunders, a widow 
_ lady, who had been twice cited before the Fiscal, ap- 
pears before him again on the 8th of September, 1823, 
to answer to the complaint of the Negro David: ‘ That 
he is too much punished with the whip and tamarind 
rods; that he is employed to work in the kitchen, gar- 
den, and also to cook; that he is swollen, and the soles 
of his feet flogged with tamarind rods; that his mis- 


* Since that period, the law of Berbice has fixed the number 
at twenty-five. 


72 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


tress says he is lazy, which is the cause of his being 
flogged; he was flogged with the whip lately; he has 
a beating at his heart, the cause of his illness; his 
body (I veil the indecent expressions employed in the 
original) shows that he has been lately punished, not 
to any excess, but the punishment much neglected. 
Soles of his feet examined; show no marks of punish- 
ment. The Negro appears to be in a dropsy, and as 
such is treated by the doctor who has the charge of the 
barracks.” 

The son of this lady undertakes to defend his moth- 
er. He says, “that the Negro is a very bad charac- 
ter ;” “that little or no work is done by him, for on the 
least harsh word he runs away: he is a constant run- 
away. My mother will not allow him to be flogged, 
because he bears the marks of former punishment so ev- 
idently. He did receive a slight punishment for run- 
ning away; this punishment was inflicted by two small 
boys with tamarind rods, and it was to endeavor to 
shame him. My brother brought him to town five days 
ago, to cook, and why he has run away I do not know. 
He was flogged by sard boys under his feet with tama- 
rind rods, on account of his back being cut wp.” 

Here it is evident that the Negro is ill, is treated as 
such by the doctor, and appears to the Fiscal “to be in 
dropsy.” There are, nevertheless, evident marks of 
recent punishment, which the Fiscal does not think was 
excessive, though “the punishment” had been “ much 
neglected.’ What do these colonial terms mean? Is 
it not the gashes and wounds were such as needed sur- 


LECTURE II. 73 


gical aid, but they had not received it? But so habit- 

_uated had the Fiscal been to such scenes, that, in his 
judgment, the punishment was not “to any excess!” 
Observe too, the manner in which the son of this lady 
pleads her cause. Not only is the propensity of this 
diseased slave to make his escape adduced, but the 
clemency of his mistress is also pleaded: she will not, 
in her humanity, allow him to be flogged, because— 
“he bears the marks of former punishment so evident- 
ly!” He was flogged under his feet with tamarind 
rods—“ on account of his back being cut up!” Such 
are the tender mercies of a female slave owner! 

The manager of thejplantation Providence, it appears, 
on one occasion laid a Negro on the ground with two 
drivers over him, who gave him fifty lashes. His in- 
nocence being afterwards proved, he went to the mana- 
ger for redress: the manager told him, “ If you do not 
hold your tongue, I will put you in the stocks.” He 
then went to his owner, Mr. Henry, who answered, “ I 
cannot help it; if is not my fault; the punishment you 
had was the manager’s fault.” As he could get no re- 
dress from either master or manager, he came to the 
Fiscal. The manager endeavored to justify himself; 
admitting that he had flogged him, but only to the ex- 
tent of thirty-nine lashes, (the number allowed by law 
for any or for no offence,) and confined him in the 
stocks every night for a week.—And what was the re- 
dress which the suffering Negro obtained? The Fis- 
cal, whose office it was to protect the slaves, reprimand- 
ed the manager for punishing a Negro on such slight 
grounds ! 


74 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


We shall, in this place, adduce only one more fact 
from the Berbice Fiscal’s official reports. Mr. Grade, 
the manager of |’Esperance, is charged by the slaves 
with various acts of severity. A pregnant woman, nam- 
ed Rosa, was employed picking coffee with some other 
women. Thinking they did not pick enough, or well, 
Mr. Grade ordered the driver Zondag to flog them. 
The driver did so. Rosa had previously objected to 
working, as being too big, and being unable to stoop; 
but the manager overruled the objection, and she went 
to pick the coffee on her knees. When Zondag came 
to her, he said to the manager, ‘ This woman is big 
with child!”” The manager replied, “ Give it to her till 
the blood flies out.” She was flogged with the whip 
doubled. This was on Friday. She was sent to the 
field on Saturday, but, being seized with pains in her 
loins, was sent thence to the hospital. The doctor ex- 
amined her and ordered her to field again. ‘The con- 
sequences were such on the Sunday, as might be ex- 
pected; dreadful indeed, but [ forbear to mention them. 
The driver Zondag, and several others confirmed the 
above statement. The driver being particularly asked, 
whether, on his representing that Rosa was pregnant, 
the manager had used the expression, ‘“‘ Never mind, 
flog her till the blood comes,” replied, ‘‘ Yes.” 

These are only a few cases out of the long and hor- 
rible list from one colony only.* In the Mauritius; 


* The reader will find a much larger selection in a pamphlet 
entitled “ The Slave Colonies of Great Britain,” and in the An- 


LECTURE II. (g3) 


which is much further removed from the observation of 
the mother country, atrocities have been perpetrated to 
which all that has yet been mentioned is ‘‘ as nothing 
and vanity!” But I will not harrow up your feelings 
by a recital of the inhuman, the diabolical cruelties, the 
multiplied lashes, the ponderous chains, the barbarous 
mutilations; the slow murders, and all the horrors which 
brand with eternal infamy the slave system of that isl- 
and, and those who administer it.* 

Allow me to adduce one more fact from another 
quarter, in proof of the misery to which slaves are ex- 
posed from the arbitrary punishments of their owners: 
it is taken from a dispatch of Mr. Secretary Huskisson 
to the Governor of the Bahamas, dated 28th September, 
1827.— 

I have received your despatch of the 3d July last, 
transmitting the minutes of evidence on the trial of 
Henry and Helen Moss, suggesting certain considera- 
tions in their favor, and recommending a remittal of the 
fine which formed a part of the sentence. 

“These persons have been found guilty of a misde- 
meanor, for their cruelty to their slave Kate; and those 
facts of the case, which are proved beyond dispute, ap- 
pear as follows: 

“Kate was a domestic slave, and is stated to have 


u-Slavery Reporters, No. 5 and 16, from which the above cases 
have been extracted. 


*See No. 44 of the Anti-Slavery Reporter, which contains 
statements from official papers, and from living witnesses, enough 
to make one’s blood run cold. 


76 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


been guilty of theft; she is also accused of disobedience, 
in refusing to mend her clothes and do her work, and 
this was the more immediate cause of her punishment. 
On the 22d of July, 1826, she was confined in the 
stocks, and she was not released till the 8th of August 
following, being a period of seventeen days. The 
stocks were so constructed that she could not sit up or 
lie down at pleasure, and she remained in them night 
and day. During this period she was flogged repeat- 
edly, one of the overseers thinks about six times; and 
red pepper was rubbed upon her eyes, to prevent her 
sleeping. ‘Tasks were given her, which, in the opinion 
of the same overseer, she was incapable of performing ; 
sometimes because they were beyond her powers, at 
other times because she could not see to do them, on ac- 
count of the pepper having been rubbed on her eyes; 
and she was flogged for failing to accomplish these 
tasks. A violent distemper had been prevalent on the 
plantation during the summer. It is in evidence, that 
one of the days of Kate’s confinement she complained 
of fever, and that one of the floggings which she receiv- 
ed was the day after she had made the complaint. 
When she was taken out of the stocks she appeared to 
be cramped, and was then again flogged. The very 
day of her release she was sent to field labor, (though 
heretofore a house servant,) and on the evening of the 
third day ensuing was brought before her owners, as 
being ill and refusing to work, and she then again com- 
plained of having fever. They were of opinion that 
she had none then, but gave directions to the driver, if 
she should be ill, to bring her to them for medicines in 


LECTURE III: 7é 


the morning. The driver took her to the Negro-house, 
and again flogged her ; though at this time, apparently 
without orders from her owners todo so. In the morn- 
ing at seven o’clock she was taken to work in the field, 
where she died at noon. 

“The facts of the case are, thus far, incontrovertibly 
established ; and I deeply lament, that, heinous as the 
offences are which this narrative exhibits, I can discov- 
er no material palliation of them among the other cir- 
cumstances detailed in the evidence.” 

A bill of indictment for murder was preferred against 
Mr. and Mrs. Moss; the grand jury threw it out. The 
Attorney-general preferred. two other bills, for misde- 
meanors; one against Mrs. Moss, the other against Mr. 
Moss and his wife; upon both of which a verdict of 
guilty was returned, And what was the condign pun- 
ishment for such fatal cruelty 2 Five months’ impris- 
onment, and a fine of 300/. currency!—But it may be 
said, that the misconduct of one or two does not prove 
any thing against the whole. But the witnesses who 
deposed to the character of Mr. and Mrs. Moss repre- 
sent them as standing high for humanity among slave- 
owners. ‘The most respectable people of the island pe- 
titioned for a mitigation of their punishment, visited 
them in prison, did every thing to identify themselves 
with them, and finally, on their liberation from jail, gave 
them a public dinner as a matter of triumph! 

Enough has been said on this part of the subject, and 
on authority which cannot be disputed. We shall now 
consider the condition of the enslaved Negro in another 


78 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


view; not with reference to his master only, but tn his 
ried to society at large. And here again the evils 
of the system stand out in dreadful prominence. 

There is in these colonies a complete inequality of 
law and right. What is right in the one is wrong in 
the other ; what is tolerable in the white, is punished in 
the black; what is a venial fault in the master, is highly 
criminal in the slave; and criminality and punishment 
have a relation to the different offenders precisely the 
reverse of what they have in all other cases. In the 
laws of God, and in all human laws which are founded 
on justice, superior advantages render men more re- 
sponsible, and, of course, give to their bad actions a 
higher degree of criminality; but here the educated 
White is considered in the eye of the law as less guilty, 
and the poor ignorant Black the greater delinquent. 
The law is fastidiously delicate in punishing the master, 
but ruthless and vindictive when the slave is concern- 
ed. ‘Till of late years the slave was liable to the pun- 
ishment of death for almost every thing: he might, in 
some colonies, be mutilated by the act of running away 
from severe usage: for endeavoring by force to break 
his chains, he might be burnt alive by inches, or 
hung up to perish in a cage.* Mr. Stephen mentionst 


had bith actually took place in J amaica : see ‘‘ Edwards’s Hist. 
of the W. Indies,” vol. 11. b. iv.ch. 3. One was slowly burnt; and 
of the other two that were gibbetted, one lingered till the eighth 
day, the other till the ninth. 


+ “Slavery of the Brit. W. India Colonies delineated,” vol. i. 
p. 309, note. 


LECTURE II. 79 


that when he was in Barbadoes he was present at a trial 
for murder, in the event of which two Negroes, convict- 
ed of the offence, were burnt alive.* At that very 
time and place had the White man, for whose death 
they suffered, murderedf either of them, he would have 
been subject toa fine of 15/. currency; that is about 111. 
sterling. 

It is true, that the agitation of the subject in Parlia- 
ment, owing to the efforts which were made to procure 
the abolition of the slave trade, and the public attention 
which has since that period been directed to the state 
of the colonies, have produced many alterations in these 
shameless, brutal, penal statutes; { but, unfortunately, 
the same spirit of a most unequal distribution of justice 
pervades even the recent meliorating Acts. Let a few 
specimens suffice. 


* Mr. Jeffries, a Master in the Navy, gave evidence before the 
Select Committee of the House of Commons that he was present 
at the execution of seven Negroes for the murder of a White 
man, in ‘Tobago,in 1774; whose right arms were chopped off: 
they were then dragged to seven stakes, and a fire, consisting of 
trash and dry wood, was lighted about them, and they were burnt 
to death. 


+ According to Stroud, in the United States, the wilful mnrder 
ofa Slave, by whomever perpetrated, is at the present time, 1827, 
(though not until recently,) punishable by death; but the difficulty 
is in procuring evidence, Slave testimony not being admissible. 
The law is therefore necesarily in many cases inoperative.— 
Am. Ep. 

+ That the usagesin the colonies fully equalled, and even ex- 
ceeded, the inhumanity of their laws, see ‘“ Abstract of Evidence 


before a Select Committee of the House of Commons, in the 
Years 1790 and 1791,” pp. 52 to 89. 


» 


80 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


In the new slave law of the Bahamas of 1824, it was _ 
enacted, §) 52—54, that a slave aiding a slave to de- 
part from the Bahama islands shall suffer transporta- 
tion, or any other punishment not extending to life or 
limb. A White committing the same offence shall 
forfeit 100/. and be imprisoned for not more than twelve 
months.—-§ 17. A person wantonly or cruelly treating 
a slave is liable to be punished by fine or imprisonment, 
or both, at the discretion of the court: and §§ 14, 15, 
The wilful mutilation of a slave is made liable to be 
punished by a fine not exceeding 1001. (currency,) and 
imprisonment not exceeding twelve months. But § 48, 
Any slave offering violence, by striking or otherwise, 
to any white person, shall be punished, at the discretion 
of two justices, with any punishment short of life and 
limb. 

In the new consolidated and amended slave act of 
Barbadoes of 1826, it is enacted, § 27, that “any slaves 
guilty of quarrelling or fighting with one another; or 
of insolent language or gestures to or OF any person ; 
or of swearing, or ultering any obscene speeches; or 
of drunkenness ; or making, selling, throwing, or firing 
squibs, serpents, or other fire-works; or of cock-fight- 
ing or gaming; or of riding on a faster gait than a 
walk ; or of drivingzupon a faster gait than a gentle 
trot, on any road, street, or lane of the island; or of 
cruelly whipping, beating, or ill-using any horse, mule, 
ass, or other cattle; or of negligently driving any 
waggon, cart, carriage, &c.; or of ANY disorderly 
conduct or misbehavior;—shall, on conviction before 


LECTURE II. Sl 


any justice of the peace, be whipped at his discretion, 
not exceeding thirty-nine stripes.” — Now contrast with 
this the provisions respecting the aggressions of a White 
man :* § 44 enacts, that any person who wantonly com- 
mits erwelty towards a slave, by whipping, bruising, or 
beating, &c. shall be fined, by any two justices, not less 
than 25/7, and not exceeding 100/.; and §45 subjects 
any white or free person maiming or dismembering a 
slave to he imprisoned not less than six months, and 
fined not less than £100, the interest of which is to be 
an annuity to the slave for life, and the slave to be trans- 
ferred (not liberated) to some master of humane repute. 
Slaves} who strike, or offer, or dare to strike, or use any 


*The following is a provision of the law of South Carolina, 
passed in 1740, and still unrepealed. “ In case any person shall 
wilfully cut out the tongue, put out the eye, cruelly seald, burn, 
or deprive any slave of any limb, or member, or shall inflict any 
other cruel punishment—(otherwise than by whipping, or beating 
with a horsewhip, cowskin, switch or small stick, or by putting trons 
on, or confining or imprisoning such slave) every such person shall, 
for every such offence, forfeit the sum of one hundred pounds, 
current money.”—Am. Ep. 


+ Contrast now the punishment of the Slave for striking his 
master with that of the master abusing his slave, mentioned in 
the preceding note. It is the law in Georgia, “If any slave shall 
presume to strike any white man, such slave, upon trial and con- 
viction before the justice, shall for the first offence suffer such pun- 
ishment as the said justice thinks fit, not extending to life or limb; 
and for the second offence, death.” . The same is the law in South 
Carolina, excepting that death is there, the punishment of the third 
offence.—Am. Ep. 


6 


82 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


violence towards their master or mistress, shall, for the 
first offence, suffer death without benefit of clergy, trans- 
portation, or such other punishment as the court may 
think fit to inflict; and for the second, death without 
benefit of clergy. And § 43, If any slave shall be killed 
in the attempt to maim or injwre any white person, the 
person killing any such slave shall not be punished for 
the same, either criminally or otherwise. 

What, indeed, could be expected from a system of 
legislation, when the oppressors make laws for the op- 
pressed, slave-owners for the slaves? Who can seri- 
ously suppose that the habits and prejudices of those 
who are accustomed to slavery are favorable to the 
formation of a code of laws which shall effectually pro- 
tect them from the overbearing tyranny of white men? 
Can it be reasonably expected, that a system which has 
its foundation in the perversion of all right should pro- 
duce laws distinguished for their justice? ‘ Do men 
gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?” Did not 
the Speaker of one of these legislatures, (that of Barba- 
does,) on lately passing a bill, which, professing to adopt 
reforms forced on them by the voice of the British peo- 
ple, nevertheless contained enactments that would dis- 
grace the Barbary States, if they were to attempt to leg- 
islate on such a subject, congratulate the assembly on 
the monument of benevolence which they had reared, 
and for which they might anticipate the admiring grati- 
tude of posterity ? 

It is no wonder, in such circumstances, that the ad- 
ministration of the laws is such as to shock all our ideas 


LECTURE II. 83 


of what is right and proper. The following cases are 
extracted from Jamaica newspapers. 


“ Public Advertiser, Kingston, Jamaica, April 22d, 
1825. 

** Sentence.—For manslaughter—The prisoner was 
put to the dock, and by his council, Mr. Recorder, plead- 
ed his clergy. His honor then passed sentence :—‘ You 
were indicted for the wilful murder of a female slave, 
but the jury only found you guilty of manslaughter. It 
appeared in evidence, that you were amusing yourself by 
discharging a loaded gun through the window of your 
dwelling-house; after some time, this gun was reloaded 
by one of your companions, and you proposed firing it 
over an assemblage of Negroes: he declined; when you 
POINTED OUT A NEGRO OF YOUR OWN PROPERTY, AND PRO- 
POSED TO FIRE AT HIM: he again declined: you then re- 
newed your proposal to fire it over the crowd; and upon 
his refusing, you seized the gun; the result was, that 
this female slave, who was sitting in the crowd, was 
shot, and the melancholy event was soon announced to 
you by the cries and lamentations of her mother. By 
your HEEDLESs conpucT you have hurried a fellow-crea- 
ture out of existence, you have bereft a mother of a child, 
and you have affixed a stain upon your own character, 
which it will require a long life of prudence and humani- 
ty to obliterate. The humane jury who tried you, ac- 
companied their verdict with a recommendation to mer- 
cy. We will give that recommendation its due weight, 
and not inflict the full extent of punishment upon you ; 
we hope, however, that the punishment we shall inflict 
will act as a warning to others, and make a due impres- 
sion on yourself.’ The prisoner was then sentenced to 
TWELVE MONTHS’ IMPRISONMENT.” 


84 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


By the side of this, place the following notice, taken 
from the Royal Jamaica Gazette, June 11th to 18th, 
1825. ‘Richard Price, a Wangee, marked REID on 
the right, and apparently H on the left shoulder; he 
was sentenced, at a slave court, to twelve months’ hard 
labor in the workhouse, for offering violence to a White 


person.” * 


On the 2d of March, 1826, Mr. Denman brought for- 
ward a motion, respecting the trials of certain slaves in 
Jamaica, charged with conspiracy and rebellion. In 
the debate which followed, the most gross and scandalous 
perversion of justice, in the trial and execution of many 
unhappy Negroes, was admitted on all hands; and 
though the original motion of Mr. Denman was not car- 
ried, the House came wnanimously to the following res- 
olution :— 

“That this House sees, in the proceedings which 
have been brought under its consideration, with respect 
to the late trials of slaves in Jamaica, further proof of 
the evils inseparably attendant upon a state of slavery; 
and derives therefrom increased conviction of the pro- 
priety of the Resolutions passed by this House on the 
15th of May, 1823.” 

It must have been no feeble impression, no slight con- 
viction of the mal-administration of justice, which, in a 
House where the colonial interests are so strongly sup- 
ported by members connected with the West Indies, and 
where the Ministers of the Crown have always mani- 


* Copied from the Anti-Slavery Reporter, No: 9. 


LECTURE Il. 85 


fested a leaning towards the planters’ side of the ques- 
tion, could produce such a resolution without a dissen- 
tient voice. 

What unprejudiced person could read the trial of Smith 
the Missionary, who was martyred by the justice of 
Demerara; and that of the poor slaves, some of whom 
were condemned to be hung, and others had what was 
represented as a merciful commutation of punishment, 
being doomed to receive a thousand lashes, and to work 
in chains for life, without shuddering at the cruel mock- 
ery of justice, which has left a stain of infamy on that 
colony, that ages will not wipe out? 

It forms no small part of the evil which presses on 
the slave, that, whatever injury he receives from a white 
man, especially from his master, to whose power he is 
constantly subject, redress is very difficult, if not im- 
practicable. It must be so from the very nature of his 
condition. If he receive an injury, to whom can he ap- 
peal? T’o the justices? They are all white men; 
most of them planters, whose education and _ habits 
strongly pre-dispose them in favor of their own caste.* 
Nor have they, in Jamaica at least, the advantage of a 
jury, except the offence for which they are tried subjects 
them to death, transportation, or hard labor for more 
than one year. They may be imprisoned, compelled 


* See a very striking and affecting case of this kind mentioned 
by Mr. Bickell, who was present when some half-starved and 
cruelly mangled female Negroes and their children sought in 
vain redress from a sitting of magistrates. “ West Indies as they 
are,” pp. 28, 29, &c. 


86 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


to work in chains, receive any punishment of the whip, 
short of life and limb, at the discretion of justices. But 
should they be tried by a jury, still it isa jury of White 
men, connected more or less with the planters, and 
whose sympathies are all in favor of their own class. 
The case, we may naturally suppose, must be strong 
indeed to produce a conviction in favor of the injured 
Black. 

Another serious obstacle in the way of redress is, the 
inadmissibility of slave evidence. This, till very lately, 
was complete. The evidence of slaves against slaves 
was always admitted; and many have been put to death 
on no other testimony: but against white men it was of 
no avail.* The hardship of this was intolerable; the 
obstruction which it placed in the way of justice almost 
insuperable. An enraged slave owner had but to send 
his white dependants out of the way, and he might maim 
or murder to whatever extent his passion might carry 
him. How many deeds of cruelty and blood have thus 
been screened from the punishment of human laws, the 
great day of retribution only will reveal! ‘I know,” 
said the Attorney-General of Tobago, “as a magistrate, 
cases of extreme cruelty that have passed unpunished 
for want of slave evidence.” “It is very common, when 
they wish to be cruel, to send free persons out of the 
way. I have known many such cases.” The Chief 
Justice of the same island, Mr. Pigott, testifies as fol- 





* See “Slavery of W. Indies delineated,’ by Mr. Stephen, pp. 
167, &c. &e. a 4 it 


LECTURE Il. 87 


lows: “A manager sent all free persons out of the 
way, and then gave a Negro one hundred and fifty 
lashes. The Negro was brought, in a state of which he 
might have died, to us, the sitting magistrates. We had 
no means of proving it. I proposed a bill to admit slave 
evidence, or to make the accused purge himself on oath. 
The bill was not approved.” * 

When Mr. Denman brought forward the motion 
already mentioned, in the House of Commons, on the 
2d of March, 1826, he thus alluded to some cases ¢ of 


* Extracts from ‘“‘ A Report on the Civil and Criminal Justice 
of the West Indies,” by Mr. Dwarris, quoted in the Third Report 
of the Anti-Slavery Society for 1825. 


t In the United States there is no law regulating the punish- 
ment of the slave. It depends upon the discretion, caprice, or 
passion of the master. How far these are safe guides to supply 
the place of legal enactments, the following cases extracted from 
a recent publication upon Slavery may determine. It is probable 
that a large number of similar ones might be collected annually, 
ifthere were any means of doing it, and if the Southern press 
were not closed against the recital of such heart-rending in- 
stances of inhumanity and brutality—Am. Ep. 


“ A gentleman in this city saw a harness-maker in Charleston 
seize a leather tug or trace, containing a heavy iron eye in the 
end, and, with this instrument, held with both hands, draw sever- 
al strokes over the body and head of aslave. ‘The master was 
totally regardless whether the iron lit upon the head, or the eye, 
or the mouth of the slave. He cried out piteously that his master 
would kill him. "The sight was too painful for an unaccustomed 
spectator, and the gentleman withdrew. ‘This slave had been 
sent from the country by the sister of the person who so punished 
him, to be taught domestic service; and his offence was some 
slight awkwardness or trifling blunder in his new employment.* 

“ A clergyman of Kentucky declared that he had seen a mas- 


* Mr. Preston Shepard, of Boston. 


88 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


great atrocity, which had been publicly stated in the 
House of Assembly in Jamaica, during the discussion 





ier whip repeatedly a female slave who was upwards of eighty 
years old, and who had been this master’s ‘mammy,’ that is, had 
nursed him at her breast, in his infancy.* | 

“ A gentleman who has been in North Carolina, has seen a fe- 
male slave, who complained of illness, and refused to work, struck 
with the blade of a paddle, twelve or fifteen blows. Two hours 
after this treatment she was confined. Thesame gentleman saw 
a free negro tied to a tree, and a negress slave, who was attached 
to him, ordered to whiphim. She refused, saying she loved him 
too well. The white men then tied her up and gave her ‘ five.’ 
This overcame her resolution, and she consented to whip the 
man. t 

“In derision, this tree was called ‘the Lafayette tree.’ The 
secret of this affair was, that the negress had been the mistress 
of one of these whites. Yet we are told that whites are elevated 
too much above negroes to feel resentment or revenge towards 
them.t 

“The Duke of Saxe Weimar states that a female slave was 
whipped at New Orleans by her mistress, that her lover was com- 
pelled to stand by and count off the lashes, and that she was after- 
wards publicly whipped by the magistrate. Her offence was, 
that, being engaged in some other duty, she had not started quite 
as quick to bring water to a lodger as he thought she should do. 
He struck her a blow in the face which made the blood run, and 
she, in sudden heat and resentment, seized him by the throat.§ — 

“The Rev. Mr. Rankin details the case of a female slave in 
Kentucky, the mildest and freest of the slave States. Her master 
had purchased an article of furniture, which his wife, in the 
presence of a neighboring gentleman, had the misfortune to 
break. She laid this accident to the slave girl, when her husband 
made inquiry respecting it. He suspended the girl from the limb 
of a tree in a manner not to be described, and commenced the 
usual operation of whipping. Extreme torture drew from her a 
confession, but when the pain was eased, the poor girl returned 
to her first and honest denial, whereupon the whipping recom- 
menced. Fortunately, the identical gentleman who was a wit- 
ness of the accident, happened to be passing. He declared the 
truth, and rescued the girl.ll 

“Mr. William Ladd, known as a friend of colonization, and an 


* MS. of Mr. Garrison. { Mr. Francis Standin, of Boston. 
{ Murat. Saxe Weimar’s Travels. || Rankin's Letters, p. 108. 


LECTURE II. 89 


of a bill to admit, in a very qualified and restricted man- 
ner, the testimony of slaves. 

“Another case, Mr. Stewart (the gentleman who 
brought forward the bill,) said was of very recent date. 
‘In this town (Spanish Town) a white man, a monster 

of cruelty, concealed a female slave in a room, where, 
with a hot iron used for burning marks on cattle, he 


opponent of this Society, and not likely, therefore, to exaggerate 
but rather to soften the harsh features of the system, alludes pub- 
licly to the following, among other horrors which he has wit- 
nessed: A gentleman of his acquaintance, was offended with a 
female slave. He seized her by the arm, and thrust her hand in- 
to the fire, and theré he held it until it was burnt off. ‘I saw,’ 
said Mr. Ladd, ‘ the withered stump.’* 

“Mr. Sutcliff, an English Quaker, who travelled in this coun- 
try, relates a case very like that of the Kentucky girl, only that the 
catastrophe was more shocking. A slave owner, near Lewis- 
town, in the State of Delaware, lost a piece of leather. He 
charged a little slave boy with stealing it. The boy denied. The 
master tied the boy’s feet, and suspended him from the limb of a 
tree, attaching a heavy weight to his ancles, as is usual in such 
cases, to prevent such kicking and writhing as would break the 
blows. Hethen whipped; the boy confessed ; and then he com- 
menced whipping anew {for the offence itself. He was a kind 
master, and never whipped the lad again, for he died under the 
lash! 'Then the slave-holder’s own son, smitten with remorse, ac- 
knowledged that he took the leather.t 

‘“‘ An honorable friend, who stands high in the state and in the 
nation, was present at the burial of a female slave in Mississippi, 
who had been whipped to death atthe post by her master, because 
she was gone longer of an errand to the neighboring town, than 
her master thought necessary. Under the lash she protested that 
she was ill, and was obliged to rest in the fields. To completethe 
climax of horror, she was delivered of a dead infant before her 
master had completed his work!” + 


* Mr. William Ladd’s Address at the meeting of the Massachusetts Coloni- 
zation Society, Jan. 1833. 

t Sutclif’s Travels in North America, p. 177. See Boston Calumet of Peace, 
vol. 1. No. 12. 

{ The narrator of this fact is now absent from the United States, and I do 
not feel at liberty to mention his name. 


90 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


disfigured and mutilated the poor creature, who was so 
unfortunate as to be in his power. He trusted to the 
effect of the law which prevented slaves from giving ev- 
idence; but it chanced that a young free man of color, 
suspecting what was going forward, peeped through a 
crevice, and saw the horrid scene. On his evidence the 
owner of the slave was convicted and punished.’”’ 

“ Another fact was related by Mr. Mais: ‘There is 
one instance, which, because of recent occurrence, I 
must take leave to mention. It is the case of a female 
slave, who on her return home was met by a free man 
of color, who had been out shooting. A little dog, 
which accompanied her, barked, and probably might 
have snapped at the man. This irritated him, and he 
threatened to shoot the dog: the woman, alarmed for 
his safety, called out, ‘Oh don’t shoot him; don’t shoot 
my dog;’ upon which the man turned angrily upon 
her, and said, ‘Not shoot him? Tl shoot you, if you 
say much,’ and with little ceremony lodged the con- 
tents of his piece in her side. This was in the face of 
day, in the presence of many persons, but who, being 
slaves, were not qualified to give testimony on the occa- 
sion, and the offender escaped.” 

In the Crown colonies, and in Grenada, and Tobago, 
slave evidence is now admitted. In any of the other 
colonies the pretended concession of the right is so ex- 
tremely partial, and is attended with so many conditions 
and restrictions, as entirely to nullify every benefit to be 
derived from such a provision. 

It must also be taken into the account, that on the 


LECTURE II. 91 


poor slave’s application to a magistrate for redress, 
though thus trammeled with respect to evidence, he is 
liable to receive a very severe flogging, in addition to 
the injury of which he complains, should he fail to prove 
his complaint to the satisfaction of the magistrate. In 
that case, he is not only replaced, with the mortification 
of unredressed grievances, under the despotism of an 
owner or overseer incensed against him by the very 
circumstance of his complaining, but may return bleed- 
ing under additional punishment for having had the 
temerity to complain. 

A document appeared in the daily papers in October 
1823, which Mr. Stephen notices in his “ Delineation of 
Slavery,” purporting to be “an official notification, by 
Sir Ralph Woodford, Governor of Trinidad, of his hav- 
ing punished two Negro slaves, one with seventy-five 
and the other with a hundred lashes, for a complaint 
against their master, which that Governor says he had, 
upon investigation, proved to be groundless; and he 
ordered these tremendous punishments to be inflicted, in 
the presence of deputations of ten slaves from each of 
the neighboring estates, for the express purpose of de- 
terring them from like offences.” * 

In the returns of the Fiscal of Berbice, from which 
extracts have been already made, there are several in- 
stances ofthis kind: some are ordered to receive fifty 
lashes, and others seventy-five, for venturing to appear 
before him, when they could not establish to his satis- 





* Ina note to p. 115, vol. i. 


92 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


faction the truth of their complaints. We shall only 
however, give the particulars of one case, in which the 
decision of this gentleman appears somewhat curious. 
It is from the plantation Port Moraunt, dated 27th 
March, 1823. 

“ Ness states, That he is the driver over the women, 
and the manager asked him last Sunday why he did 
not go to work; and he answered that he had not been 
ordered to do so, or he would have gone to work, as he 
did not wish to do any thing without the manager’s or- 
ders. The manager then offered to flog him; but he 
made his escape, and came to your Honor for redress. 

“The complainant in this instance was punished by 
the acting Fiscal for having left the estate and come to 
town to complain without any cause, and when he had 
been guilty of disobedience of orders and neglect of 
duty; and the manager was warned of the impropriety 
and illegality of working the Negroes on Sunday.” 

What an instructive illustration is this, of the proba- 
bility of an injured slave's obtaining redress, and the 
encouragement which he has to seek it! First, we per- 
ceive that the slave has no right to question either the 
morality or legality of whatever a manager orders him 
to do; that to refuse to violate the laws of God and 
man, at the bidding of his employer, is “ disobedience 
of orders,” which subjects him to the lash. Secondly, 
that to endeavor to escape from a severe and unjust 
punishment, threatened by the manager, subjects him 
to punishment from the fiscal ;—that it is a flagrant 
crime to solicit the interposition of the Protector of 


LECTURE II. 93 


Slaves to save him from undeserved torture ;—that, if 
he wishes to seek redress, he must suffer all that enrag- 
ed passion may inflict, in order to entitle him to com- 
plain. And lastly, that, when the white master has act- 
ed in open violation of the Divine laws, as well as those 
of the colony, he is warned only of the “impropriety 
and illegality of the act,” while he receives a guarantee, 
in the flogging of the complainant, that he may hence- 
forth work his Negroes on Sundays with impunity; for 
what slave, after this would remonstrate? Thus the slave 
is punished for appealing to the laws which are made 
to protect him, andthe master is rewarded for breaking 
them. So much for colonial justice and slave protection ! 

There is another class of sufferings at which we shall 
briefly glance, which arises from those social feelings 
which the God of nature has imparted to man. De- 
pressed and degraded as is the condition of the slave, 
he is still susceptible of strong affection and ardent at- 
tachment. In his native Africa, and in his state of exile 
and of bondage, the Negro is allowed to possess a con- 
siderable share of sensibility. Gratitude to a benefac- 
tor, attachment to a friend, love to the woman of his 
choice, (though the law has long refused to her the sanc- 
tions of a wife,) filial affection, and tender regard for 
his offspring, still remain to him, amidst all the vices 
which his enslaved condition has engendered: but in 
all his social feelings, he is exposed to the keenest mis- 
ery by this wretched system. If he has a wife, he dares 
not protect her from the driver’s lash, from cruel and 
indecent punishment, or from the white man’s outrage. 


Vu 


94 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


If he has daughters, he dares not defend them from 
brutality and violence. If he murmur, there is the 
tormenting lash: if he resist, it is death! 

And besides this, there are the separations* to which 
they are liable, by which the nearest ties may be burst 


* The following cases of painful separation, are given by Pro- 
fessor Andrews, in his book upon Slavery in the United States. 
p» 111.—Am. Ep. 


“ A negro, about twenty-five years old, whois married, and has. 
three or four children, has just applied to my informant, stating 
that he is to be sold immediately to a slave-dealer, and separated 
forever from his family, unless he can find some resident in the 
District who will consent to purchase him. He is a member of 
a church in this city, and has uniformly sustained a Christian 
character. His master wishes to raise a few hundred dollars, 
which he has not the means of doing conveniently, without the 
sale of one of his slaves. Now it happens that the purpose for 
which this money is to be raised is well known, and is no other 
than to purchase a mulatto woman, with whom he is known to 
be criminally connected. As if even this were not a sufficient 
provocation to the moral sense of the community, there is an ag- 
gravation arising from the motive which determined the master 
to sell the slave of whom I am speaking, rather than any other. 
He had endeavored to employ this slave in bringing other color- 
ed women into the same relation to him as the mulatto woman 
whom I have mentioned, but here the servant felt that he had a 
Master in heaven, whom he was bound to obey, rather than his 
earthly master. His refusal had greatly irritated his master, 
and led to his being selected for sale. 

“‘A poor woman is now residing in this city, who, together with 
her two children, was, some years since, separated from her hus- 
band, and brought to this place, in order to be shipped for Geor- 
gia. In her distraction at being separated from her husband, 
she leaped from an upper window, and falling upon the pavement, 
her limbs were broken in a shocking manner. She is a helpless 
cripple, but in her affliction she has applied to the great Physi- 
cian, who heals the maladies of the soul, and is now waiting in 
the confident hope, that she shall meet again her dear children, 
rt where the wicked cease from troubling, and the weary are at 
rest. 


LECTURE II. 95 


asunder. On the estates of wealthy proprietors this, 
perhaps, occurs less frequently ; but in other cases, what 
is to prevent its daily occurrence? .One of a family 
may be seized and sold for debts or taxes—it may be a 
husband, wife, father, mother, or child;—or a needy 
slave-holder may be pinched for money. How affecting 
is the relation of Mr. Gilgrass, one of the Methodist 
missionaries.— 


‘A master of slaves who lived near us in Kingston, 


Jamaica, exercised his barbarities on a Sabbath morn- 


ing, while we were worshipping God in the chapel; 
and the cries of the female sufferers have frequently in- 
terrupted us in our devotions. But there was no re- 
dress for them, or for us. This man wanted money; 
and one of the female slaves having two fine children, 
he sold one of them, and the child was torn from her 
maternal affection. In the agony of her feelings she 
made a hideous howling, and for that crime was flogged. 
Soon after he sold her other child. This ‘turned her 
heart within her,’ and impelled her into a kind of mad- 


ness. She howled night and day in the yard; tore her 
_ hair;:ran up and down the streets and the parade, rend- 
ing the heavens with her cries, and literally watering 


the earth with her tears. Her constant cry was, ‘ Da 
wicked massa, Jew, he sell me children. Will no buck- 





ra massapity Nega? What medo? Meno have no child? 
As she stood before my window, she said ‘ My Massa,’ 
(lifting up her hands towards heaven,) ‘do me Master: 


| Minister, pity me? Me heart do so, (shaking herself 
violently ;) ‘ me heart do so, because me have no child. 


96 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


Me go a massa house, in massa yard, and in me hut, 
and me no see em ;’ and then her cry went up to God. 
I durst not be seen looking at her.” 

Mr. Bradnack, another missionary, says, “I know an 
instance of a Negro and his wife being sold to different 
islands, after living together twenty-four years, and 
raising a family of children.” * 

One case more I beg leave to mention, which was 
stated at a public meeting by Mr. 'T. Pennock :— 

“ A few years ago, it was enacted, that it should not 
be legal to transport once established slaves from one 
island to another; and a gentleman owner, finding it 
advisable to do so before the Act came in force, the re- 
moval of a great part of his live stock was the conse- 
quence. He hada female slave, a Methodist, and highly 
valuable to him (and not the less so for heing the mother 
of eight or nine children,) whose husband, also of our 
connexion, was the property of another resident on the 
island, where I happened to be at the time. Their 
masters not agreeing on a sale, separation ensued, and 
I went to the beach to be an eye-witness of their beha- 
vior in the greatest pang of all. One by one the man 
kissed his children, with the firmness of a hero, and, 
blessing them, gave as his last words—(oh! will it be 
believed, and have no influence upon our veneration for 
the Negro?) ‘Farewell! Be honest and obedient to 
your master!’ At length he had to take leave of his 


* “ A Defence of the Wesleyan Methodist Missions in the 
West Indies,” &c. by the Rev. R. Watson, pp. 25, 26. 


LECTURE II. O7 


wife: there he stood (I have him in my mind’s eye at 
this moment,) five or six yards from the mother of his 
children, unable to move, speak, or do any thing but 
gaze, and still to gaze, on the object of his long affec- 
tion, soon to cross the blue wave forever from his ach- 
ing sight. The fire of his eyes alone gave indication 
of the passion within, until, after some minutes’ standing 
thus, he fell senseless on the sand, as if suddenly struck 


down by the hand of the Almighty. Nature could do 
no more; the blood gushed from his nostrils and mouth, 
as if rushing from the terrors of the conflict within ; 


and amid the confusion occasioned by the circumstance 


the vessel bore off his family forever from the island ! 
_ After some days he recovered, and came to ask advice 


of me! What could an Englishman do in such a case? 
I felt the blood boiling within me, but I conquered. I 
browbeat my own manhood, and gave him the hum- 


blest advice I could afford.’’* 


These agonizing separations cannot now take place, 
it is true, by a removal to another island, except by an 
evasion of the law; but they may still be repeated by a 


transfer to another owner, in some distant part of the 
same colony, so that the parties thus severed may never 


; 
1 


‘ 


meet again. 

In fact, their whole state is that of complete degra- 
dation; and the manner in which they are treated is as- 
similated, as much as possible, to that of cattle. We 


* Newcastle Courant, May 2, 1829. 
(i 


\ 


98 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


can scarcely conceive of a lower state of debasement 
than that to which the Negro slave is reduced. What 
is it which constitutes the great distinction between man ~ 
and the brutes that perish? ‘The elephant is stronger, 
he horse is fleeter. He has not the eye of the eagle, 
nor the scent of the hound; but he has a miad—an im- 
material spirit, an immortal soul. This intellectual 
principle is capable of acquiring knowledge on eve- 
ry subject, and of extending its knowledge perpetu- 
ally; of judging what is right and wrong in human 
conduct; of governing the appetites of the body; of 
searching into the wonders of nature; of interchanging 
its ideas with others for mutual benefit; of perceiving 
the glories of the Creator, the wonders of Redeeming 
Mercy, of holding intercourse with “the Father of our 
spirits,’ and of being prepared, by a course of instruc- 
tion and moral discipline, for the sublime enjoyments of 
the heavenly state. By the communication of know- 
ledge, the powers of the mind are brought into activity, 
and by this exercise acquire additional strength; but 
without this, the mind Jies dormant; the man sinks into 
a mere animal, with barely sufficient glimmerings of 
reason to supply the want of those instincts, which guide 
the brute creation to the accomplishment of the purpo- 
ses of their existence. “For the soul'to be without 
knowledge is not good.” But what means are taken 
to instruct and educate the British slave?* On some 





* In the United States, the same policy is pursued of keeping 
the Slaves in a state of utter ignorance—Am. Eb. 





LECTURE II. 99 


few plantations a little is done—alas! how little; in the 
vast majority of instances nothing, and worse than noth- 
ing. How can it be otherwise, since the children at 
five or six years old are commonly sent to work in 
gangs, under the terror of the whip or switch; and their 
whole future life is destined to unremitting toil, without 
even the privilege of the Christian Sabbath free from 
their provision-grounds or market. 

The building of more churches, which are still very 
inadequate for the population, and the appointment of 
curates, in Jamaica, seem to have done but little towards 
the instruction ofthe poor slaves. For, however willing 
the curates may be to instruct them, the planters appear 
to impede all their kind intentions of this nature. Mr. 


“ South Carolina made the first law upon this subject. While 
yet a province, she laid a penalty of one hundred pounds upon 
any person who taught a slave to write, or allowed him to be 
taught to write. In Virginia, any school for teaching reading 
and writing, either to slaves, or free people of color, is considered 
an unlawful assembly, and may accordingly be dispersed, and pun- 
ishment administered upon each pupil not exceeding twenty 
lashes. 

“ In South Carolina, the law is the same. 

) “ The city of Savannah, in Georgia, a few years ago, passed an 
_ ordinance, by which ‘any person that teaches a person of color, 
slave or free, to read or write, or causes such persons to be so 
taught, is subjected to a fine of thirty dollars for each offence; 
ahd every person of color who shall teach reading or writing, is 
subject to a fine of thirty dollars, or to be imprisoned ten days and 
whipped thirty-nine lashes.’ 

“ F'rom these facts it 1s evident that legislative power prevents 
amaster from giving liberty and instruction to his slave, even 
when such a course would be willingly pursued by a benevolent 
individual. The laws allow almost unlimited power to do mis- 
chief ; but the power to do good is effectually restrained.”—Mrs, 
 Child’s Appeal, p. 58. 


100 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


Stewart declares that ‘ nine-tenths of the people are an @ 
state of utter ignorance of all religion.” And, alluding 
to the provision made for the newly-appointed curates, 
he asks, ‘‘ What, then, has been done, by this newly 
established order of clergy in Jamaica, in return for the 
generous encouragement of the Legislature? Little 
more than, as was predicted, to assist the rectors in the 
performance of those duties which they were well able 
to discharge without such assistance. The curates 
have, in fact, been accused of utter neglect and ineffi- 
ciency in their offices, as far as regards the duties for 
which they were expressly appointed by the Legislature. 
It is but fair, however, to state what has been said in 
exculpation of them, which, if true, shifts much of the 
blame from them, and fixes it elsewhere. A writer in 
one of the public prints of this island (1820) complained 
that ‘the curates had done nothing in the way of their 
calling, except saving the rectors the trouble of per- 
forming the whole of ther proper and exclusive duties 
—in other words, doing that which is nof, and neglect- 
ing to do that which 7s, expressly required of them by 
the Legislature, namely, visiting the plantations, at 
stated times, for the purpose of baptizing and instructing 
the slaves in the Christian faith; provided, however, it 
is with the consent of their owners!’ In reply to this 
charge, another writer (supposed to be a clergyman) 
says, ‘Has he’ (the first-named writer) ‘allowed the 
curate of his parish an opportunity of discharging the 
functions of his office towards his Negro servants, agree- 
ably to the tenor of the Act on which he lays so much 


LECTURE II. 101 


stress? Ifnot, he has no reason to complain of neg- 
lect: if he has, he is almost a solitary instance, as, to 
my knowledge, some curates have applied to many pro- 
prietors, trustees, and managers of properties, expressing 
not only their willingness, but their desire, to be called 
upon to discharge the active duties of their office in the 
instruction of the ignorant slaves, but in no single in- 
stance have therr services been accepted ; and surely it 
cannot be expected that any man, who has a proper re- 
gard for himself, would intrude on the property of anoth- 
er, though for the most praise-worthy purposes, with 
the apprehension in view of being turned off it.’ 

“The allegation thus publicly brought forward by 
this apologist has not been satisfactorily replied to; and 
we must therefore conclude that there is a general dis- 
inclination on the part of the planters to have their slaves 
instructed in Christianity.” * 

In the year 1817 Mr. Cooper was sent, by a humane 
and wealthy proprietor resident in England, to his own 
estate in Jamaica, for the express purpose of instructing 
the slaves; but found such obstacles in the way, that, 
after some years’ residence, he returned discouraged. 

It will not, I trust, be deemed invidious to say, that 
perhaps most that has been done of this kind has been 
effected by missionaries sent out by the various religious 
societies not connected with the Church of England. 
Yet, through what difficulties has this been effected ! 


* “ View of the past and present State of the Island of Jamaica, 
by J. Stewart, late of Jamaica,” pp. 291, &c. Mr. Stewart, it will 
be recollected, is not an abolitionist. 


102 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


Have they not been commonly opposed, slandered, per- 
secuted, and had the greatest obstructions placed in their 
way? What bitter malignity was manifested towards 
the martyr of Demerara, who, if not brought to the 
stake, was destroyed by the miseries and horrors of his 
mock trials and captivity—buried like a traitor, and not 
even his wife allowed to attend his funeral. The out- 
rages committed on the Methodists at Barbadoes, the 
persecuting acts of the Jamaica legislature, the death of 
one missionary in a loathsome dungeon, the imprison- 
ment of others,* with a number of other things of a simi- 
lar nature, all prove the aversion of the slave owners 
generally to the instruction and religious + education of 
the» Negroes. What has been effected in instructing 


* See the Appendix to the Report of the Wesleyan Methodist’ 
Missionary Society for 1829. 


+ The same is the fact in the United States —Am. Ep. 


“No places of public worship are prepared for the negro; and 
churches are so scarce in the slave-holding States, compared with 
the number of white inhabitants, that it is not to be supposed great 
numbers of them follow their masters to such places; and if they 
did, what could their rude, and merely sensual minds compre- 
hend of a discourse addressed to educated men? In Georgia, 
there is a law which forbids any congregation or company of 
negroes to assemble themselves contrary to the act regulating 
patrols. Every Justice of the Peace may go in person, or send a 
constable, to disperse any assembly or meeting of slaves, which 
may disturb the peace, endanger the safety, &c., and every slave’ 
taken at such meetings may, by order of the justice, without trial, 
receive on the bare back twenty-five stripes with whip, switch, 
or cowskin. In South Carolina, an act forbids the police officers 
to break into any place of religious meeting before nine o’clock, 
provided a majority of the assembly are white persons; but if the 
quorum of white people should happen to be wanting, every slave 
would be liable to twenty-five lashes of the cowskin.”—Mrs. 
Child’s Appeal, p. 56. 


LECTURE II. 103 


these poor creatures has been partly by the permission 
of a few humane proprietors; or by the indifference of 
others as to what the slaves did, provided they had their 
quantum of labor; and notwithstanding the opposition 
of the planters generally. As far as the efforts of the 
great body of colonists are concerned, the slaves are 
kept in a state of brutal ignorance, and no legal provi- 
sion whatever has been made for their instruction in 
any of the colonies. 

Like cattle too they have been suffered, and even en- 
couraged, to herd together; not with the sanctity of 
marriage, but in promiscuous intercourse. Since the 
loud and deep reprobation of England has been heard 
across the Atlantic, there has been a show of patronising 
marriage; but small indeed are the sanctions which the 
law affords to this state, and few are the encouragements 
which the Negro has to enter it. Some have taken 
wives of their own accord, and have been faithful ; this, 
however, appears to be the exception, rather than the 
rule. 

In 1826, a document was printed by the House of 
Commons, called “ Returns from the Slave Colonies,” 
which embrace a period of five years, from January 
1821, to December 1825. From these we find, that in 


Barbadoes, which contains about 80,000 slaves, only 
one marriage among them took place in these five years, 
and that none was ever celebrated there before. In 


Demerara, containing about 75,000; in Berbice, con- 
taining 22,000; in Tobago, containing 14,000; in the 
Virgin Islands, containing upwards of 5,000; there was 


104 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


but one marriage among the slaves during that period 
What must be the state of society, where nearly 200,000 
human beings, male and female are herding together 
for five years with only one couple legally married ! 
By the returns from Jamaica it appears, that in eleven 
parishes, containing 173,000 slaves, sixty-eight marriag- 
es had taken place in these five years—that is, about 
thirteen in a year—in the other parishes, with but one 
exception, marriage had prevailed chiefly where the 
Methodist preachers had obtained a footing.* Thus, 
then, among the general mass of the slave population, 
that intercourse, which has been the substitute for mar- 
riage, has been, from one generation to another, almost 
as promiscuous as among herds of cattle.t 

There is, indeed, a dreadful and debasing consistency 
in the whole of their treatment. They are, as we have 
already noticed, bought, and sold, and bred, and work- 
ed, and flogged, and branded, more like brute animals 
than human beings. If any thing is construed into in- 
surrection, they are shot at, like wild beasts. If, having 
escaped, they make the least resistance, they may be 
cut down; and if taken, are compelled to work in chains, 





* See copious extracts from this document in the Anti-Slavery 
Reporter, No. 19. 

+ Thisis one of the most hideous features of the system of 
Slavery, and it is as prominent inthe American, as it was in the 
West Indian system. If there is any thing that should rouse the 
Christian, benevolent, patriotic people of this country, it is the 
appalling fact, that there are 2,250,000 human beings here, whose 
conjugal, parental, filial relations are set at nought.—Am. Ep, 


LECTURE III. 105 


“or are placed by night in the stocks; or may have a 


large collar fastened on their necks, like beasts which 
are accustomed to break through an enclosure, or to 
stray beyond their limits. 

The following are extracts from a list of Run-aways, 
and Work-house Sales, copied “ verbatim et literatim,” 
by the Rev. R. Bickell from the Jamaica Journal, pub- 
lished Nov. 8, 1823.* 

** RUN-AWAYS. ” 
“In St. Andrew’s Workhouse, Oct. 30. 


“Betty, a Papa, 5 ft. 1 in. marked ISL on right shoul- 
der, and has country marks on her face and breast, to 
James Seton Lane, Esq.,. Cool-shade, St Thomas’s in 
the Vale.—Sept. 9. | 

“In Kingston Workhouse, Oct. 31. 


“John Stephens, a likely young Creolé Negro man, 5 
ft. 6 3-4 in. marked MI on left shoulder, has a large scar 
on the left side of his throat, and other scars between his 
shoulders and neck, to the estate of Mr. Mark, of Black 
River, Dec.—Aug. 5. 

“In Morant Bay Workhouse, Oct. 16. 

*“Cudjoe, a Creole, 5 ft. 1 in. has marks of cutlass 
chops on his back, which he states to have received sev- 
eral years ago when taken up as a run-away, to Dr. Pau- 
lin, Grove, Manchester.—Oct. 12. 

‘Hannibal, a Creole, 5ft. 1 1-2 in. has marks of cutlass 
chops on his shoulders and on right hand, which he states 
to have received several years ago, on being taken up as 





* “ West Indies as they are,” pp. 38, &c. 


106 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


arun-away, to Mr. Biggs, Endeavor Plantation, Man-~ 
chester.—Oct. 12.” 

In the Jamaica Royal Gazette, from Saturday, June 
14th to Saturday, June 21st, 1823, from which Mr. T. 
Clarkson has made many extracts, there are advertise- 
ments/of so many ‘prime Negroes, with’’ so many 
“ head of stock;” of another lot “seized, together with 
a cart, by the Deputy Marshal,” for their master’s debts ; 
run-away slaves, some branded, others chained togeth- 
er, and others with iron collars on at the time of their 
escape; some distinguished by their sears and» flog- 
ging, and a girl by “ the scars on her back and stomach 
from flog ging.” 

There is one consequence of this system, to which, 
in concluding this branch of the subject, I shall briefly 
advert; and that is, the mischiefs which it inflicts even 
on free Blacks and Persons of Color. The contempt 
with which they are treated, in proportion as their color 
approaches to that of the enslaved race, is notorious. 
No intercourse of equality can be held with them, what- 
ever be their qualifications; no wealth, nor talents, nor 
virtue can remove the proscription. : 

There is also a presumption against the freedom of 
this persecuted race. Ifthe written document be lost, 
the freedom purchased or bequeathed may prove of no 
avail. ‘The free Black or Person of Color may be 
seized, and sold again to bondage: his captors have no 
need of proving that he isa slave; it is sufficient if 
he cannot, to the satisfaction of his White judges, prove 
his freedom. Hence it is no uncommon thing for ad- 


"ate 


LECTURE II. 107 


__yertisements to appear in the colonial papers, describing 


the person of a black, or colored man, who has been ap- 


_ prehended asa run-away, “ who declares that he is free, 


but has no document to prove his freedom,” and who, 


“if not claimed by such a time will be sold to pay ex- 


penses!” In the Returns already referred to there are 
notices of this kind. 


In the parish of Westmoreland, onthe 21st of August, 
1821.—“ John Williams, a Negro man, a pretended Cu- 
racoa.” No evidence of freedom produced. Sold from 
Workhouse in January. 

In the parish of Port Royal.—“ Joseph Franks, a black, 
committed as a run-away 9th October, 1821;” sold for 
payment of fees on 6th March, 1822, having no docu- 


ments. 


In the parish of Manchester.—“ Eleanor Davison, com- 


“mitted July 22, 1824:” being able to produce no docu- 


ment whatever, or to adduce any kind of proof of her 
freedom, was ordered to be sold, according to law. 


Such are the hardships to which even the free of Af 
rican descent are exposed; and all who have any tinge 
of the Negro’s skin are under the ban. Though they 
have escaped from the galling yoke, it has left its mark, 
which they are doomed perpetually to wear. The 
curse of slavery pursues them, and ceases not to tor- 
ment and afflict them, as long as any memento remains 
that their ancestors were persecuted Africans. It is 
upon the enslaved Negro, that the full and central dark- 
ness of the eclipse rests; but the free Black and Color- 


108 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


ed population are all involved in its penumbral shad- 
ows.* 


We shall now proceed to notice the moral evil, the 
sin and iniquity connected with our colonial slavery. 
It is as fruitful of crimeas it is of suffering. It is alto- 
gether a system of oppression, and cruelty, and injus- 
tice, in which virtue can find no place, or in which, if 
any good can be found, it is in opposition to its natural 
tendency. 

First, if we regard its victims, what can be expected 
of them? Destitute of all instruction, worked like 
brutes, and punished more severely; crushed by the 
iron hand of oppression into the dust; having every 
thing to fear, and nothing to hope for; without any im- 
pelling motive but that of terror; with scarcely any 
possibility of enjoyment but what arises from his mere 
animal nature, what virtue can we look for in the poor 
slave? If his appetites and passions are checked, it is 
not by the operation of principle, but by the dread of 
corporeal punishment. Can any thing manly or gene- 
rous be expected from those who are debased to the con- 
dition of brutes, who are kept in a state of perpetual 
and abject servility? Can we suppose that a very nice 


* Slow as those, who have never informed themselves, may be 
to believe, it is the fact, that the above description of the cruel- 
ties of Slavery, as it was in the British West Indies, is strictly 
applicable, in all its parts, to the Slavery that is now enforced upon 
more than one sixth part of the population of this Republic.— 
Am. Ep. 


LECTURE II. 109 


sense of justice will be entertained by those who are 
constantly treated with injustice; who know it, and 
feel it; who see the White man sin with impunity, and 
the Black man often suffering without crime? Can 
we be so unreasonable, as to look for undeviating hon- 
esty and integrity in those who are conscious that they 
are the subjects of continued wrong, inflicted by those 
whom they regard as so much their superiors in know- 
ledge? Are they not constantly taught by the conduct 
of White men, that power is right; and that, therefore, 
whatever they are able to do with impunity they have 
aright todo? Must they not feel that fraud and cun- 
ning are the only weapons with which they can engage 
the White man and obtain any advantage? Shall we 
then wonder, as we are told by all who know the Ne- 
gro character, that, in the midst of all their ignorance, 
there is a shrewdness which seems natural to them; 
that the system of oppression under which they live 
cherishes the habits of falsehood and petty theft? Can 
purity and chastity exist in such circumstances as theirs, 
where there is no protection of the marriage union; 
where all are allowed to herd together as the beasts of 
the field, and have, in the conduct of the White men, 
so bad an example before theireyes? What means are 
used to enlighten their minds or form their morals ? 
Can any plant of virtue vegetate without the light of 
knowledge and the culture of instruction? What are 
they suffered to know of Christianity, but its outward 
forms; and what impression must they receive of it 
from their Christian masters? Can they see any thing 


110 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


in it which is attractive? What motives have they to 
embrace it? Ignorant alike of the doctrines and the 
duties, the Divine consolations and the holy precepts 
of Christianity, they remain Pagans in a Christian” 
land, without even an object of idolatrous worship; 
“having no hope, and without God in the world.” Let 
not, then, the abettors of slavery, who trample their fel- 
low-creatures beneath their feet, tell us, in their own 
justification, of the degraded state, the abject minds, and 
the vices of the slaves: it is upon the system which 
thus brutifies a human being, that the reproach falls in 
all its bitterness.* ° 

But the evil does not rest here: it has a re-action, 
which suffers neither the slave-owner nor his white de- 
pendents to escape with impunity. Such is the consti- 
tution of things, that we cannot inflict an injury without 
suffering from it ourselves. In doing good we receive 
good: he who blesses another benefits himself; but he 
who sins against his fellow-creature does his own soul 
a grievous wrong. ‘The oppressor is, in reality, in a 
worse condition than the oppressed. If we rightly con- 
sider the case of those who administer this system, the 
scenes to which they have been familiarized from their 
infancy, the habits which they have formed, the preju- 


* Let those of our readers, who would learn from an unques- 
tionable source, that the degradation of our colored population is 
the effect of their social and moral disabilities, turn to the Re- 
port made in 1833, to the Presbytery of Bryan County in Geor- 
gia, by Thomas R. Clay—also to the Report of Rev. C. C. Jones 
to the Synod of South Carolina and Georgia —Am. Ep. 


LECTURE Il. 111 


dices which they have acquired, and the inevitable ten- 
dency of unlimited power to corrupt the human heart, 
we shall consider them as much the objects of pity, in a 
moral estimate, as the poor Negro. “Perhaps it is,” 
says Mr, Birkbeck, “in its depraving influence on the 
moral senses of both slave and master, that slavery is 
most deplorable. Brutal cruelty, we may hope, is a 
rare and transient mischief; but the degradation of soul 
is universal. All America is now suffering in morals 
through the baneful influence of Negro slavery, partially 
tolerated, corrupting justice at the very source.” 

Mr. Fearon declares, in his Sketches of America, that 
“the existence of slavery in the United States has a 
most visible effect on the national character. It neces- 
sarily brutalizes the minds of the southern and western 

inhabitants; it lowers, indeed, the tone of humane and 
correct feeling throughout the Union, and imperceptibly 
contributes to the existence of that great difference which 
there exists between theory and practice.” * 

Mr. Jefferson, quoted by Lieutenant F. Hall in his 
“Travels in Canada and the United States,” says, 
“There must, doubtless, be an unhappy influence on the 
manners of the people, produced by the existence of 
slavery among us. The whole commerce between 
master and slave is a perpetual exercise of the most 
boisterous passions; the most unremitting despotism on 

the one part, and degrading submission on the other. 
Our children see this, and learn to imitate it; for man 


* pp. 378, 379. 


” * 


Lig LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


is an imitative animal. The parent storms; the child 
looks on, catches the lineaments of wrath, puts on the 
same airs in the circle of smaller slaves, gives loose to 
the worst of passions; and, thus nursed, educated, and 
daily exercised in tyranny, cannot but be stamped by it 
with odious peculiarities. The man must be a prodigy 
who can retain his morals and manners undepraved in 
such circumstances.’ * 

Who, indeed, with a knowledge of the human heart, 
could consider the peculiar character of modern slavery, 
independently of the facts which have been adduced, 
but must come to the conclusion that its influence on the — 
moral character is most pernicious, and its tendency un-~ 
equivocally demoralizing? To have an absolute pos- 
session of a hundred or a thousand human beings; to 
work them, punish them, dispose of them, as the owner 
lists; to have them trembling at his frown, crouching 
beneath his power, subservient to all his wishes, is more 
than human nature can endure without serious injury : 
in such circumstances I would not trust even a Howard 
or a Wilberforce. It must minister to some of the worst 
propensities of human nature: selfishness, pride, haugh- 
tiness, anger, revenge, a spirit of domination that cannot 
brook restraint and must not be crossed, seem to be its 
necessary results. 

How can a correct sense of justice be maintained in 
the mind of a man who invades the natural rights of his 
fellow-men, claims them and theirs as his property, and 
treats them lilre his cattle ? 


* Notes, p. 241. 


LECTURE II. 1138 


Must it not tend to destroy in a considerable measure 
the charities of our nature—at least greatly to impair 
those sensibilities and sympathetic affections which 
render us alive to the pleasures and the pains of our 
fellow-creatures? By being familiarized to scenes 
which at first shock us, we cease to feel; and by the re- 
petition of acts which for a time offend our conscience, 
even our conscience may become “ seared as with a hot 
iron.” 

In a voluptuous climate, in a state of society in which 
but little regard is paid to marriage, in which the ut- 
most subserviency is exacted, on the severest penalties, 
from every slave, male and female, is it not likely that 
sensual indulgences will prevail at the expense of 
virtue ? 

Is there any reason to conclude, that where, by uni- 
versal consent, the sacredness of that day is violated 
which Christianity consecrates to Divine worship and 
religious instruction, religion itself can be much re- 
garded ? 

Such would naturally be the reasonings, a priori, of 

any considerate mind, when reflecting on the tendencies 

of our slave system; and the conclusions to which they 
would lead us are supported by the testimony of en- 
lightened and impartial men, and by the admissions 
even of those who are averse to its abolition. 

Mr. Edwards, who in his History advances every 
thing which can extenuate the evils of West Indian 

slavery, observes, that “it very frequently happens that 
the lowest white person, considering himself as greatly 
“superior to the richest and best educated free man of 
| 8 


114 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


color, will disdain to associate with a person of the lat- 
ter description; treating him as the Egyptians treated 
the Israelites, with whom they held it an abomination 
to eat bread.” * 

The Rev. R. Bickell affirms, that “such is the pride 
and jealousy of the colonists against any having the 
least tinge in them, that, however worthy, wealthy, or 
well-educated they may be, the males are deprived of 
most privileges, and shut out from all trusts and offices ; 
and the females, however fair and chaste they may be, 
(for many of them are as fair and chaste as the white 
women, and particularly, as to the latter, those who 
have been educated in Britain,) are not allowed to marry 
the lowest white man: at least, if a white man were to 
marry one of them he would be scouted and persecuted 
as a thief and a vagabond, and shunned as though he 
-were a monster, or would infect them with the plague.” f 

Mr. Stewart says, “ Wherever slavery exists there 
must be many things attending it unfavorable to the im- 
provement of the minds and manners of the people: 
arbitrary habits are acquired ; irritation and violent pas- 
sions are engendered, partly, indeed, by the perverse- 
ness of the slaves; and the feelings are gradually blunt- 
ed by the constant exercise of a too unrestrained power, 
and the scenes to which it is continually giving birth.” 
—<‘Human nature is shaped and governed by the force 
of early habits and of example. The very children, in 





* “Fistory of the West Indies,” vol. ii. p. 20, ed. 1793. 

i“ West Indies as they are,” pp. 113, 114. In the Appendix, 
Note 17, Mr. B. gives some striking instances of the most insuf- 
ferable pride and haughtiness of this kind. 


LECTURE II. 115 


some families, are so used to see or hear the Negro ser- 
vants whipped for the offences they commit, that it be- } 
comes a sort of amusement to them.” * 

What can show ina more striking manner the la- 
mentable tendency of slavery to harden the heart, and to 
suppress the benevolent feelings, than its effect on the 
female character? Inthe gentler sex we naturally look 
for all that is kind and compassionate. If the charities 
of our nature are not enthroned in the heart of woman, 
where shall we look for them? A kind and tender- 
hearted compassion is identified with all our ideas of fem- 
inine loveliness. 'T‘his appears to be characteristic of 
the sex in every part of the world, whatever color hap- 
pens to tinge the skin... More than once was Mr. Park, 
the African traveller, indebted to the humane sympa- 
thies of Negro females, for food, and shelter, and every 
hospitality, when in a land of strangers, But nothing, 
it seems, can withstand the hardening tendency of slave- 
ry. We do not wonder to hear frequently of men who, 
though when first they beheld the miseries of the en- 
slaved Negro they were horrified, become by degrees 
so accustomed to these things as to lose all feeling; 
when even females are rendered so totally indifferent, 
through habit, to the sufferings of their slaves, as not 
only to be reconciled to them, but to take an active part 
in their infliction. Mr. Stewart remarks, that “it un- 
fortunately happens that the females, as well as the 
_ males, are too apt to contract domineering and harsh 





_ * “ View of the past and present State of the Island of Jamaica,” 
| p. 170. 


116 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


ideas with respect to their slaves; ideas ill suited to the 
natural softness and humanity of the female heart.” 
And, alluding to the punishment of slaves in the pres- 
ence of children, he adds, “Such inflictions may in time 
be viewed with a sort of savage gratification: in the 
males it may produce brutality of mind; and in the fe- 
males, to say the least of it, an insensibility of human 
misery and acold contemplation of its distresses.”—_ 
“Such is the power of habit over the heart, that the wo- 
man accustomed to the exercise of severity soon loses 
all the natural softness of her sex.” * 

The following fact is related on the authority of Cap- 
tain W. EF. Owen, of the Royal Navy. t 

When his Majesty’s ships, the Leven and the Barra- 
couta, employed in surveying the coasts of Africa, were 
at Mozambique in 1823, the officers were introduced to 
the family of Senor Manuel Pedro d’ Almeydra, a native 
of Portugal, who wasa considerable merchant settled on 
that coast; and it was an opinion agreed in by all, that 
Donna Sophia d’ Almeydra was the most superior woman 
they had seen since they had left England. Captain 
Owen, the leader ofthe expedition, expressing to Senor 
d’ Almeydra his detestation of slavery, the Senor replied, 
“You will not be long here before you change your 
sentiments. Look at my Sophia there. Before she 
would marry me, she made me promise that I should 
give up the slave trade. When we first settled at Mo- 
zambique, she was continually interceding for the slaves, 


* “View of the past and present State of the Island of Jamaica,” 
pp. 171, 172. 
+ Anti-Slavery Reporter, No. 32, pp. 171, 172. 


LECTURE II. 117 


and she constantly wept when I punished them; and 
now she is among the slaves from morning to night; 
she regulates the whole of my slave establishment; she 
inquires into every offence committed by them, pro- 
nounces sentence upon the offender, and stands by and 
sees him punished.” 
In the report of the Fiscal of Berbice, the name of a 
“lady stands prominent for the cruelties of which her 
slaves complain: in the Bahamas, the wife of a slave 
owner was convicted of a series of barbarities which 
_ terminated in the death of an unhappy being of her own 
sex; and in the Mauritius, cruelties almost surpassing 
_ belief were perpetrated by a Madame Nayle, on the per- 
son of a female slave, who expired under the hands of 
_ her tormentors.* : 
The licentiousness of manners which prevails in the 
slave colonies, and which obviously arises from the sys- 
tem, appears, by the testimony of men of all parties, who 
have had opportunity of personal observation, to be be- 
yond dispute. What else originated the People of 
Color, as the marriage of a White man to one of the 
Negro race is hardly known? But if the whites think 
that marriage with blacks, or even with persons of col- 
or, is so infamous, they do not think it at all dishonora- 
ble to live with them in open and lawless concubinage : 
this is practised, says the Historian of the West Indies, 
“by white men of all ranks or conditions.” “'The fact 


* This last case, with several others of atrocious cruelty, the 
Editor of the Anti-Slavery Reporter states on the authority of in- 
formants who are willing, if it should be deemed necessary, to 
come forward with their names. Wo. 44, pp. 391, 392. 


118 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


is 100 notorious to be concealed or controverted.” * Dr. 
Williamson too, who resided several years on an estate 
belonging to the Earl of Harewood, in Jamaica, though 
an apologist for the system, makes the same admissions. 
Speaking of the reckless licentiousness of the Negroes, 
he adds, “ And the truth requires that it should not be 
concealed, the Whites on estates follow the same habits, 
on many occasions, to a greater extent.” + Mr. Stewart 
speaks in terms equally strong of “the most gross and 
open licentiousness ” which “ prevails among all ranks 
of the Whites.” t 

The Rev. R. Bickell observes, that “It is a well 
known and notorious fact, that very few of the white 
men in the West Indies marry, except a few profession- 
al men, and some few merchants in the towns, and here 
and there, in the country, a proprietor or large attorney. 
Most of the merchants and shop-keepers in the towns, 
and the whole of the deputy planters (viz. overseers) in 
all parts of the country, have what is called a house- 
keeper, who is their concubine, or mistress, and is gen- 
erally a free woman of color; but the book-keepers, 
who are too poor and too dependent to have any kind 


* “ Edwards’ History of the West Indies,” book IV. chap. i. 


+t The Doctor adds, “ Black or Brown mistresses are consider- 
ed necessary appendages to every establishment: even a young 
book-keeper, coming from Europe, is generally instructed to pro- 
vide himself; and however repugnant may seem the idea at first, 
his scruples are overcome—he conforms to general custom.” See 
‘Medical and Miscellaneous Observations relative to the West 
India Islands, by T. Williamson, M.D.” vol. i. p. 49. 

t“Past and present State of Jamaica,” p. 173. “Every un- 


married white man, and of every class, has his black or brown 
mistress, with whom he lives openly.” 


LECTURE II. 119 


of establishment, generally take some mulatto or black 
female slave from the estate where they are employed, 
or live in a more general state of licentiousness. This 
is SO very common a vice, and so far from being ac- 
counted scandalous, that it is looked upon by every per- 
son as a matter of course; and if anewly-married young 
man happens to have brought a few moral or religious 
ideas with him from Great Britain, he is soon deprived 
of them by taunt and ridicule, and is in‘a short time un- 
blushingly amalgamated into the common mass of 
hardened and barefaced licentiousness.” * 

The white ladies are, indeed, exempted from this gen- 
eral charge; but what must be the state of society and 
the tone of morals, when all this open profligacy has 
not the least tendency to lower a man’s character, even 
in the estimation of females of respectability? “Ifa 
gentleman pays his addresses to a lady, it is not thought 
necessary, as a homage to her delicacy, to get rid, a 
priort, of his illicit establishment; nor is the lady so 
unreasonable as to expect such a sacrifice.”—“ But the 
most striking proof of the low estimate of moral and re- 
ligious obligation here, is the fact that the man who 
lives in open adultery—that is, who keeps his brown 
or black mistress, in the very face of his wife and family, 
and of the community—has generally as much outward 
respect shown him, and is as much countenanced, visit- 
ed, and received into company, especially if he bea man 
of some weight and influence in the community, as if 





** West Indies as they are,” pp. 104, 105, 


120 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


he had been guilty of no breach of decency or derelic- 
tion of moral duty.” * 

After such statements, we are fully prepared for the 
information, that there exists a very general inattention 
to the duties of religion, and that Christianity is little 
better than a name. We have, indeed, much to deplore 
in our own country; but we are thankful that Sabbath — 
breaking is not an act of necessity ; that Sunday mar- 
kets are not universal, and established by law. “A 
great market,’ says Dr. Williamson, “is kept for the 
Negroes,” (he is speaking of the manner in which Sun- 
day is spent,) ‘which is, in truth, also a market for the 
Whites. The merchants attend at their stores and 
counting-houses.” ‘“ Where the Sabbath is violated, 
the manners of the mass of people are vicious, regard- 
less of every commendable principle, and afford exam- 
ples of human depravity which, it is with reluctance I 
must say, is too applicable to that country”’ (i.e. Jamai- 
ca.) ‘It must be admitted that the means of religious 
instruction to Negroes in Jamaica are yet extremely 
defective ; and it is still more painful to add, that the 
White inhabitants are culpably inattentive to public re- 
ligious duties. It were wellif that were all. Contempt 
for religion is openly avowed by a great proportion of 
those to be met with in that country.” t 

The author of the “ Past and present State of Jamai- 
ca” fully corroborates this view. He speaks of “the 


*“ Past and present State of Jamaica,” by Mr. Stewart, pp. 
174, 175. 


t “* Medical and Miscellaneous Obseryations on the West In- 
dia Islands.” 


LECTURE II. 121 


gross immorality which too generally prevails among 
all ranks.” * “In the towns a more genteel society is 
to be found than on the plantations; but the state of 
morals is much the same; and as to the respect paid to 
religion, it will be sufficient to say, that, with a very 
few exceptions, the congregations in the churches con- 
sist usually of a few White ladies, and a respectable 
proportion of free People of Color and Blacks.” t¢ 
Very few of the slaves have it in their power to attend 
church: they are either in attendance on their owners, 
or their time is occupied in a necessary attention to their 
own affairs; for Sunday is not a day of rest and relaxa- 
tion to the plantation slave; he must work on that day, 
or starve.” { And, speaking of those who engage in 
the planting line, though they may have received the 
most respectable education, they “are too prone to con- 
tract depraved habits from the example and conversation 
of those with whom they are too often obliged to asso- 
ciate. They are, indeed, not in a situation to foster and 
maintain the principles and opinions in which they have 
been educated.’ The Sabbath is as any other day to 
them; not a day of rest and religious observance, but 
one made up of a mixture of toil and amusement; and 
when they look round and see the universal licentious- 
ness that prevails, they are too apt to lose the sense of 
moral distinctions.” § 

If it were necessary to adduce any further testimony, 
we might refer to Mr. Bickell, who, as a pious clergy- 
man, felt particular interest in the religious state of the 





mes LAN t P. 182. +P. 151. feat be) Bs 


122 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


colony in which he resided, made it the subject of much 
inquiry, and had every opportunity of forming a correct 
judgment on this point. His statements, in the Second 
Part of the work from which we have already made 
several quotations, and which goes considerably ito 
detail on this topic, fully corroborate all that has been 
already advanced.* 

The evils, therefore, of this system, in a moral point 
of view, affect not only the slave but the slave-owner: 
it spreads a contagion from which but few escape who 
come within its reach. Wecannot but conclude, in the 
language of Mr. Stewart, that, “doubtless, there is in 
the very nature of slavery, in its mildest form, something 
unfavorable to the cultivation of moral feeling.”t And 
as we have shown that it isin a form far from being mild 
that it exists in our colonies, we perceive the truth of 
the dying testimony of one who fell a victim to its vices, 
and who, to a question put to him a few minutes before 
his execution, by a clergyman that attended him, replied, 
“Sir, slavery is a bad system; it is even worse for the 
masters than it is for the slaves.” f 9 

But to take a complete view of all the moral mischief 


ee 


* “ West Indies as they are:” Part II. onthe Sabbath, Religion, 
Morality, Marriages, &c. 


+ “View of the past and present State of Jamaica,” p. 181. 

t “ Anti-Slavery Reporter,” No. 32, p. 173. | 

§ We wish our readers would peruse, in connection with the 
foregoing description of the moral evils of Slavery, Dr. Chan- 
ning’s Chapter on the same subject.—Letters by J. D. Paxton, a 


minister in Virginia,—and Letters by Rev. John Rankin of Ohio. 
—Am. Eb. 


LECTURE II. 1a 


which slavery has produced, we must look to Africa. 
The slave trade is but the child of slavery; and what a 
scene of almost unvarying horror has this occasioned, 
for ages, along many hundreds of miles of the western 
coast of Africa, and considerably in the interior also? 
Bodily suffering and mental anguish have not been the 
only injuries which it has inflicted: it has excited per- 
petual wars ; encouraged robbery and murder on every 
scale, from the forces which a prince could command 
to the individual ruffian and kidnapper: it has convert- 
ed the administration of justice into an engine for the 
safe commission of crime, and multiplied to an enor- 
mous extent the means of offence to the great Creator, 
and of violence and wrong to his creatures.* 

From a commereial intercourse with Europe—en- 
lightened, Christianized Europe—what advantages 
might not Africa have expected! But what has she ob- 
tained? Her civilization has been retarded, her moral- 
ity corrupted, her sense of justice extinguished, and her 
crimes multiplied: she has been encouraged in robbery 
and violence and fraud, by men calling themselves 
Christians: she has been taught to hate and despise the 
religion of White men. 

Tell us not that we are unjustly charging the sys- 
tem with evils for which, now that England has abol- 
ished the slave trade, it is no longer accountable. How 
were the millions of slaves procured that have been 
transported to our colonies? Or, how were the scanty 





* Seethe Abstract of Evidence before the House of Commons, 
and Mr. Clarkson’s “ Cries of Africa.” 


124 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


residue of them, the 800,000, obtained, who are now 

groaning in bondage? Have the evils which slavery 

originated in Africa ceased to exist?’ The innumerable 

mischiefs which it has produced have stamped it witha 

stain so foul and deep, as to dishonor all who are con-— 
nected with it, to disgrace the individual who becomes 

its advocate, and to consign it to the everlasting repro- 

bation of all the friends of God and man. 


In noticing the multifarious evils of this system, we 
must not omit those which are ofa political nature. 
On this part of the subject I shall but briefly dwell. 
Our remarks on the various evils of slavery have al- 
ready extended to a length which was not anticipated ; 
and I freely confess that political economy and the 
mysteries of commerce have not been my favorite stud- 
ies. It might be supposed, that to reconcile the British 
people to the continuance of a system so pregnant with 
evil, entailing so much misery, and leading to so much 
crime, there must be some important national advanta- 
ges resulting from it. This, however, does not appear 
to be the case. The colonists are, indeed, loud in their 
assertions of the great benefits which the mother coun- 
try receives from these colonies—such as, the employ- 
ment of our commercial industry and capital, the large 
accessions of our annual income by the duties on colo- 
nial produce, the employment of our shipping, and the 
nursery which it forms for the navy. But it does not 
appear that there is any national advantage which arises 
from this system which would not be equally secured 
if it were altogether abolished; and certainly there are 


LECTURE II. 125 


some serious disadvantages with which it must always 
be attended. Some may derive a gain from the con- 
tinuance of this iniquitous system; but ifa few fill their 
coffers from the uncompensated toil of the enslaved Ne- 
gro, the nation in general suffers. 

That our slave colonies are maintained at a vast ex- 
pense, no one willattempt to deny; and that this is an 
expense, if not entirely created, yet most materially in- 
creased, by the slave system, must be obvious to every 
considerate mind. Even during a time of peace, the cost 
is very considerable. How is it, it may well be asked, 
that 800,000 Blacks allow themselves to be ground 
down in oppression by a mere handful of Whites? It 
is because a military force from England keeps them in 
awe; because if, goaded to madness by insufferable 
wrongs, and weary of injustice and oppression, they as- 
sert their right to freedom, they are met by the con- 
vincing arguments of English balls and bayonets, and 
have their complaints silenced by the roar of artillery. 
_ Our peace establishment for these colonies appears to be 
upwards of two millions annually—and that at a time 
when the nation is groaning beneath the weight of tax- 
ation. A very able writer concludes, after a careful 
and sober estimate, that ‘ the actual amount wrung in 
taxes from our distressed population for the direct main- 
tenance of slavery is 2,195,804/.” 

I shall now close this lecture with very briefly notic- 
ing one more view of British slavery, which partakes, 
indeed, both of a moral and political character; I mean, 
the national guilt connected with the continuance of such 
a monstrous system of evil. 


126 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


There is One, who is the Creator of the black man 
and the white, and who is “no respecter of persons.” 
His glance surveys the universe. His eye witnesses 
every action, and inthe book of His remembrance is ev- 
ery deed recorded. He is just and merciful: injustice 
and cruelty are as opposite to his character as darkness 
to light. He weighs in the balances individuals and 
nations, and will render to all according to their deeds, 
The punishments as well as the rewards of individuals 
are reserved principally to a future state; but as no na- 
tion or state can appear as such before his bar, they are 
punished or rewarded in this life. National guilt 
brought proud Babylon to the dust, destroyed commer- 
cial Tyre, and annihilated the Jews as a nation, scatter- 
ing them to the four winds of heaven. In His estima- 
tion of guilt and application of punishment, the advan- 
tages enjoyed are always taken into the account. What, 
then, must be the guilt of Britain in maintaining a sys- 
tem so iniquitous! How long did she bear her part in 
that horrid traffic which spread so much suffering and 
crime on the coast of Africa! And still she retains in 
iron bondage the helpless victims of that trade, which 
she now calls infamous. He who sitteth in the heay- 
ens, the enemy of the oppressor, the refuge of the op- 
pressed and the avenger of his wrongs, has seen all 
the horrors of the middle passage, has heard every 
groan that has burst from the Negro’s bosom in the 
place of his captivity, year after year, and age after age. 
Consider all the cruelty, and injustice, and licentious- 
ness, attending this system for such a length of time; 
and all this upheld by a nation the most enlightened, 


LECTURE II. 127 


the most evangelized, and in many respects the most fa- 
vored, in the whole world! O how dark the spot, 
how deep the stain of guilt that rests on Britain, and 
that will rest on her as long as this system is maintain- 
ed!—The national guilt which is contracted by our 
thus upholding slavery is not to be reckoned as one of 
its least evils. 

Endeavor, then, to combine the whole in one view— 
to take in the full idea of this mighty mass of evil, in 
all the sufferings of mind and body which it inflicts, in 
all its brutalizing effects and demoralizing tendencies on 
the slave and on his inaster—the miseries which it en- 
tails on man, and the guilt which it incurs in the sight 
of God,—and you will have some conception of the 


multiplied and horrifying EVILS of SLAVERY. 


s¢ 


LECTURE III. 


Berore J proceed to the topic which is to be the 
principal point of discussion in this lecture, I beg leave 
briefly to refer to that which was last delivered, in order 
to notice the principal objections which are made against 
any strong representation of the miseries of Negro 
slavery. From all who are interested in the continu- 
ance of this cruel system, as deriving from it their gains, 

and from all who on various accounts become its advo- 
 cates,* it is to be expected that an opposition will be 


*In the English edition of this work, there is in this place a 
note, pointing out the classes of persons, who were advocates of 
the slave system, and the various reasons for which they were 
opposed to its abolition. With but few and slight changes the 
same may here be given, as an accurate designation of the abet- 
tors of slavery in this republic. ‘They are the proprietors of plan- 
tations and other slave estates, with all who are employed by 
them to enforce the subjection of the slaves, and obtain the re- 
sults of their labors. Next, are those men at the north, who have 
mortgages on the estates of southern slave-holders, the number 
of which is considerable. Many hundreds of thousands of dol- 


LECTURE III. 129 


made to every attempt to expose its enormities; and the 
aim of such, of course, will be to persuade the public, 
either that these evils do not exist, or at least that slave- 
ry is not so bad a thing as it is generally represented 


and supposed to be; so that if by this means they can 


succeed in reconciling the nation to its continuance, or 


in preventing the British peopie from demanding its 


abolition, their object will be accomplished. Let us ex- 
amine the principal and most plausible statements which 


are made with this view. 
It has often been repeated, that the slaves in our colo- 








lars due tomen of property at the north, are secured by mortgages 
upon the human cattle of their southern debtors. There are, 
moreover, merchants and manufacturers here, who are trading 


_to an immense amount in the staple productions of the south, 


—— 


which are raised by the unrequited toil of the slaves. We must 
therefore regard the violent opposition to the abolition of slavery, 
which is raging through our land. as the offspring of sordid self- _ , 
ishness.— Am. Ep. Ba 

“We cannot be surprised, therefore, that editors of newspa- 
pers and writers in periodicals who aim toconciliate the wealthy 
and influential, should be co-workers with those who bind the 
bonds of oppression on their fellow-men. There is also another 
class of persons who come in as auxiliaries, who have incidental- 
ly visited for a short season some of the southern States, and have 


partaken of the good cheer of the planters, and have felt bound 


in honor to believe all that was told them of their slaves’ happi- 


ness, but who were never permitted to gaze on the naked deform- 


ities of the system ; and who, when they have returned home, as 
in duty bound, have lauded the humanity of the planters to the 
skies, and with a wonderful flippancy talked of the comforts and 
enjoyments of a plantation slave, as though it were a truly envi- 


_ able condition; while they may know no more of the interior of 


the slave system, than those who have been sitting at home at 
their own fire-side, and not perhaps half as much as those who, 
having never set their foot in those states, have had free access 
to documents furnished by the slave-holders themselves.” 


9 


130 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


nies are much better off than the peasantry of England 
or Ireiand, or than our poor manufacturers. I must 
confess I can scarcely hear with calmness such an as- 
sertion. Is it not.a sufficient reply, that the colonial 
bondsman is a slave, the British laborer a free man? 
Would the latter be willing to exchange conditions? 
This is a fair test by which the truth of such an asser- 
tion may be tried, and here I would be content to rest 
the whole merits of the case. IL would ask the poorest 
wretch that breathes the air of Britain, who toils from 
morning to night for a scanty subsistence, and beholds 
with agonizing distress his whole family pining in pov- 
erty, for what consideration he would sell himself, the 
partner of his misfortunes, and their halffamished off 
spring, with all their descendants forever, into perpetual 
bondage? For the market price of a slave 1—For the 
most princely fortune which any slave-holder possess- 
es 2—F or the whole slave colonies themselves, with all 
their wealth? No: he would reject the offer with dis- 
dain; he would consider the very proposal as an insult; 
he would say, Give me poverty, and want, and all the 
ills of life, rather than the everlasting bondage of me 
and mine.-—Shame on the man, who calls himself a 
Briton, and yet can for one moment compare a West- 
Indian slave with a poor but free peasant of England !* 


* More shame on the men who call themselves Americans, and 
yet compare the southern slave to the northern freeman, however 
poor. ‘This comparison is frequently made, even in New Eng- 
land, and it is one among other proofs, how much that reverence 
for Liberty has declined among us, which is the safeguard of our 
Republican institutions. How low must we already seem in the 


LECTURE III. 131 


But on what is the comparison founded? Is there 
not something deceptive and disengenuous in the very 
way in which the statement is made? Is it meant, as 
it would seem to imply, that the general condition of 
Negro slaves is better than that of the English labor- 
ers? No such thing: few would have the hardihood 
to make such an assertion. What does it then mean? 
Why, that there are some slaves who happen to have a 
better situation than others; who are fortunate enough 
to meet with kind masters; who have better clothing 
and houses, and more to eat and drink, than some of the 
most wretched and unemployed laborers in England.* 
That this may be the case in some instances we admit ; 
but that it is in general we cannot for a moment believe. 
The Rev. Mr. Bickell, who was an eye-witness, says, 
“What can be more absurd, than to hear it constantly 
reiterated. that the Negroes in our colonies are better 
fed and better clothed than the British peasantry? I 
have seen a good deal of the state of the English poor, 
having served curacies in Somersetshire, Gloucester- 
shire, Monmouthshire, and Wiltshire, besides having 
an intimate acquaintance with Devonshire; and I can 





eyes of our southern brethren, seeing they have presumed to pre- 
dict that “‘ within twenty-five years, owr laboring population will 
be reduced to slavery.” —Am. Ep. 

* What though the slaves may be permitted to lie dowh in 
green pastures, and drink of pure waters! What though they 
may go about the estates of their masters richly caparisoned ! 
Shall we forget the injury that is done to them asmen? Shall 
we forget that they are degraded to the condition of brutes ?—~ 
Am, Ep. 


132 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


conscientiously say, that I never saw any one, even a 
pauper, who lived in the mean hoggish way that the 
slaves in the West Indies do.”* The same respectable 
author proceeds with a comparison of their clothing and 
their huts, and comes to a similar conclusion. 

And in point of labor, what would our peasantry or 
manufacturers gain by the exchange? What advantage 
could it be to them to substitute, for the plough and the 
loom, the daily field-toil of the Negro slave wielding 
the hoe, under a scorching sun, “steadily coerced” by 
the driving whip, from the dawn of the morning to the 
shadows of night, with scarcely time to cook and eat 
his coarse vegetable mess? Or, if the men could sup- 
port this fatigue, whether weak or strong, would the 
females of the lower classes be capable of enduring it? 
If even this were borne by our laboring poor, how 
would they stand the season of crop, when, in addition 
to the fatigues of the day, they are forced to toil three 
nights in the week, or the half of every night ? 

But these are not the only circumstances to be taken 
into the account, in estimating the comparative happi- 
ness of a man’s condition: he has other sources of 
pleasure and of pain besides those which arise from his 
senses and appetites. Is he not a rational, a social be- 
ing? Has he not the common feelings of human na- 
ture? Has he no love for the mother of his children, 
no yearnings of affection for his offspring? Why, 
then, speak of him as a mere animal, and compare him 
only in those points in which a brute can be equally as 





*“ West Indies as they are,” pp. 56, 57. 


LECTURE III. 1338 


happy? Is the English laborer or the Irish peasant 
driven to his work by the lash? Can his employer at 
his pleasure lay him down and lacerate his naked flesh 
with the cart-whip? Dares his master, or any of his 
delegates, to insult his wife or daughter in his pres- 
ence? And if he should, in such a case, lift up his 
hand to defend them, is he liable to death? Does he 
see them driven in the field like himself; and may the 
object of his tenderest affection be stripped in the pres- 
ence of the whole gang, and flogged “till the blood flies 
out?” May his wife and children be seized, and sold 
by auction, or by private sale, to meet him no more on 
this side the grave? If he seek redress for his wrongs 
from a magistrate, does he fear a tremendous flogging 
for complaining ?—But I will not pursue the odious 
comparison: such an assertion can only be made art- 
fully or ignorantly. To compare the condition of Ne- 
gro slaves generally with that of the laboring poor of 
Britain, is most preposterous ; it is an insult to common 
sense. 

But it is, again, said, that, with all the disadvantages 
of his situation, the slave is contented and happy if left 
to himself. Let the colonists furnish an answer to this. 
What do they mean by so frequently talking of insur- 
rections ; and insinuating that perpetual danger exists ; 
and hinting at the dreadful consequences of revolt? 
Why are they afraid to trust these contented and happy 
people with arms, even to assist in the defence of the 
islands?) Why must they need the awe which the 
presence of a military force inspires, in order to keep 
them in this happy condition? How is it that the 


134 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


colonia] newspapers teem with advertisements of run- 
away slaves? Are contented men accustomed to run 
away from all their comfort and happiness, especially 
at the risk of being hunted down, or sabred, or shot, if 
they surrender not to their pursuers, and, if they do 
surrender, of receiving a frightful punishment? Are 
the nocturnal stocks, the. workhouse chain, the iron col- 
lar, the marks ofthe brand and of the whip, indices of a 
contented and happy population ? 

But, if it could be proved that the slave is so perfect- — 
ly contented, in a condition of hopeless and helpless ser- 
vitude, subject to the completest despotism, placed entire- 
ly at the will and caprice of another, it would only prove 
the degrading, ruinous tendency of the slave system; 
which, instead of raising the poor Negro in the scale 
of being, and teaching him to feel and think like a man, 
depresses him to the condition of a hound, that remains 
faithful to his owner whatever be his fare, and frisks 
and fawns, like a “contented and happy” dog, about 
the master who feeds and who whips him. | 

The slave happy! And what is the nature of his 
happiness ? Thus it is described by a slave-owner: 
“The improvident Negro, far from pining in misery, 
dances and sleeps, trifles and dreams away life, thought- 
less, careless, and happily ignorant of his own unpro- 
tected condition, and of the impotent fury of the laws.” 
Little time, forsooth, has he, for dancing and sleeping 
and trifling ; and his day-dreams must often be of a very 
terrific nature: but ifin such a condition. a man, en-. 
dowed with the feelings of human nature and the capa- 
bilities of a rational soul, can “trifle and dream life 


LECTURE III. 135 


away,” the more is he to be pitied. But it is here con- 
ceded that his happiness arises from sheer ignorance, 
from a brutal stupidity: it is only when he is “ left to 
himself,” when he is “ignorant of his unprotected condi- 
tion,” and knows nothing of the “fury of the laws,” 
that he is happy. And what a picture is here given of 
the felicity of a human being, possessing a rational 
and immortal spirit! We perceive, however, by this 
_ West-Indian view of slave happiness, the benevolence of 
those who oppose the impartation of knowledge to the 
Negro mind. Let not a ray of light fall on the mental 
vision of a slave; let him know nothing of Christiani- 
ty but a few outward and lifeless forms; make him as 
stupid and thoughtless as a beast, with no reflection on 
the past, no care for the future, no sense of wrongs, no 
idea of right, no care for his soul, no knowledge that 
he has one; and in this condition give him encugh to 
eat and drink, and allow him the indulgence of his sen- 
sual appetites——and you have the model of a perfect 
slave, in the very heaven of his enjoyment! 

But it is further said, that it is the interest of planters 
to use their slaves well; and therefore, without any ref- 
erence to a sense of justice or to the feelings of human- 
ity, the same principle which is sufficient to induce a 
man to take care of his cattle must operate in favor of 
the slave. That this species of selfishness may, in the 
absence of higher motives, do something for the poor 
slave, we readily admit; but that it is a sufficient guar- 
antee for his comfort and general welfare we deny, for 
these reasons: first, that this motive where it exists, is 
not so uniform and certain in its operation as to secure 


136 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


» 


its object; and in the next place, that there are cases 
where there is no room for its operation, and where it 
may even act in direct opposition to the welfare of the 
slave. 

It is a man’s interest, we know, to use his cattle well, 
and to take care that those who work them treat them 
properly; but, notwithstanding this, does not the brute 
creation groan under the cruelties of man? How 
many are injured through mere wantonness ! how many 
through thoughtlessness! and how many a noble ani 
mal has been shamefully abused ma moment of pas- 
sion! Besides, the owners of cattle are not always” 
with them, and may even never see many of them; and 
men who have no interest in them may have the care 
and the working of them. Certainly, in the opinion of 
our legislature, this motive was not deemed sufficient, 
or why was an Act of Parliament passed to prevent — 
eruelty to animals? And for similar reasons the inte- 
rest of the slave-owner in his slaves js no sufficient se-— 
curity against ill treatment. Thoughtlessness, wanton- 
ness, inebriety, the ebullitions of anger, or that irritation 
which blinds the mind even to a man’s own interests, 
may work misery to the slave—as in the case of the 
young gentleman, already mentioned, who shot a slave 
for sport; or of Mr. and Mrs. Moss, for instance, who, 
by a series of cruelties, destroyed a female who might ~ 
long have served them. It must also be remembered, 
that most of the great proprietors live in England, and 
perhaps never see a single slave that belongs to them: 
their estates are there entrusted to attorneys, some of 
whom have a great many properties of this kind under 


LECTURE IIIf. 137 


their care, and generally receive a per-centage on the 
produce. ‘“'lhese arrangements,’ says a respectable 
planter, “would not affect the comfort of the Negroes, 
if the attorney took the same interest in them that the 
proprietor must necessarily do: but here matters become 
altered; for the interest of the attorney is to make as 
much as possible from the estate, and the Negroes be- 
come only asecondary consideration.” This agent has 
the appointment of overseers, and other subordinate of- 
ficers, to whom the management of the estate is left, 
with but few visits of inspection. ‘“ Another evil,” ob- 
‘serves the author just quoted, “arises from this system. 
‘The overseers look up to this person for patronage, and 
seldom trouble their heads about the proprietors: they 
study his interest before that of the proprietors; and 
think more of making large crops to benefit their em- 
ployer, than they do of improving the condition of the 
people.” * 

But the interest of the master does not always run 
parallel with the slave’s welfare. It may happen that 
circumstances may be such, that a degree of labor 
which is destructive to the slave may enrich his own- 
er; that the gains arising from an extra effort, during 
a certain state of the markets, ‘may afford an ample in- 
demnification for the loss of a few Negroes, and the 
injury which the rest may receive.t When the cause 





*“ Notes on Jamaica, by Henry de la Beche, Esq.” p. 37. 


t Many slaves are annually sacrificed upon the sugar and cot- 
ton plantations in our country. It is calculated by the southern 
economists, that it is cheaper to use up the slaves by requiring ex- 
tra exertions from them in certain seasons, than to procure addi- 
tional hands only for those seasons.— Am. Ep. 


| 
| 


138 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


to be tried is, the master’s gain against the slave’s com- 
fort or life, there is great danger of a verdict against the 
slave: at least, as far as self-interest is concerned, it 
makes against him. And when it is further considered, 
that many ofthe slave estates are held in trust, or on life 
interest, or on other uncertain tenures; that in the lot- 
tery of planting speculations much of this kind of prop- 
erty is perpetually changing hands; that often a planter 
may have to make a desperate struggle to retrieve his 
almost ruined aflairs, or to prevent, at any risk which 
may afford the chance of saving him, the impending 
catastrophe,—it will be obvious that the interest of the 
master and the welfare of the slave may frequently be 
placed in dreadful competition. 

In fine: the advocates of emancipation are often charg- 
ed with giving an exaggerated account of the evils of 
slavery. That every slave does not suffer all the evils 
to which his condition exposes him, that some masters 
and managers are more humane and considerate than 
others, we have already admitted; but that our colonial 
slavery works in a manner most pernicious to the com- 
fort and the life of the enslaved Negro, is evident from 
the undeniable fact of the constant decrease of the slave 
population. It appears that from the years 1818 to 1824, 
a period of six years, of the eighteen West India colonies 
there was an increase in only two; in all the others a 
decrease: so that, on the whole, there was an actual de- 
crease, after deducting the manumissions, of full twenty- 
eight thousand!* There must, then, be some cause 


* Anti-Slavery Reporter, No. 26. 


LECTURE III. 139 


constantly and fatally at work thus to counteract the 
laws of nature. Among the most miserable of our 
population there is a continued increase—those very 
people who, the colonists would have us believe, are so 
much worse off in every respect than their slaves. In 
every condition, except that of slavery in our colonies, 
the Negroes who are known to be a prolific race, mul- 
tiply: the Maroons of Jamaica increase ; the free Blacks 
of the various colonies increase; St. Domingo has, it is 
said, in about twenty years doubled its population. 
The conclusion, therefore, is inevitable,—there must be 
‘some peculiarity in the slave system to produce this 
waste of life: their labor must be excessive, their food 
‘scanty, or their treatment severe ; some of all these 
causes must exist to occasion this decrease. In the An- 
t-Slavery Reporter, No. 54, are given the names of 
eleven most respectable proprietors in Jamaica, whose 
‘slaves, taken together, amounted, in 1824, to 10,201; 
where, it may be presumed, the treatment is not worse 
‘than on other estates. By returns made to the parish 
-vesiries on oath, the apparent decrease, in two years, 
ending March, 1826, was 359: so that, at this rate of 
‘Mortality, in a little more than fifty-seven years the 
whole would become extinct! And on all these es- 
| tates, it seems the number of women is greater than that 
ofthe men. Remembering the increase of the Negroes 
‘im all other circumstances, it is impossible to account 
for this fact, on the supposition that they are well fed, 
and moderately worked, and properly treated. 
And, in conclusion, let it be observed that the charg- 
es advanced in the last Lecture were not founded on 


140 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


mere imagination, or on reports which, by circulation, 
received many touches and alterations, till truth itself 
became caricatured; but on the testimony of—eye-wit- 
nesses of respectability, on the representation of planters, 
on the publication of their own gazettes, and on the offi- 
cial returns made by order of Parliament. If our de- 
scription of slavery be deeply colored and strongly 
drawn, those only are to be blamed who have furnished 
the picture, and not those who hold it up to the abhor- 
rence of all who love their fellow-creatures, and who 
fear their Maker. 

We shall now proceed to consider the wnlawfulness 
of Slavery. 

A system productive of such consequences as those 
which we have noticed, must have something in it 
which is essentially wrong. A tree which bears such 
fruit cannot be good. It is a rule applicable to systems 
as well as to men, “ By their fruit ye shall know them.” 
But, it may be said, the abuses of a system are not to be 
charged upon it: Christianity has been abused, and lib- 
erty has been abused, and the very administration of 
justice has been abused; and what is there, however 
good and lawful, which has not met with the same fate? 
But we shall endeavor to show that the evils of slavery 
are not merely incidental—are not the abuses of what 
is in itself right and proper—but that our colonial slave- 
ry is inherently, essentially, incurably evil; that no 
modifications can destroy this its essential quality; and 
that though its luxuriances may be pruned, and some of 
its branches lopped off, the evil still remains, and will 
remain, until the axe be laid at the root of the tree. | 


LECTURE IIl. 141 


By Slavery I do not mean those restrictions of civil 
or religious liberty, which, however wrong and galling, 
cannot, but in a highly figurative sense, be called slave- 
ty: nor do I mean that restraint under which an offend- 

er is put for any term of years, or even for his life; 
(would that this punishment were more generally sub- 

‘stituted for the death of the transgressor!) but I mean, 
what the colonists contend for, a right and property in 
their fellow-creatures, as goods and chattels; “ a prop- 
‘erty in fee,” to use Lord Seaford’s words, in the flesh 
and blood of a human being, and of all who may de- 
scend from him forever, 

When I say that slavery is wnlawful, Ido not mean 
that human enactments have not been made in its favor, 
but I do mean that no human laws can make that “ law- 
ful and right” which is essentially wrong, and which 
is contrary to the eternal and immutable principles of 
justice. Nor can it be supposed that I mean that it is 
unlawful to endure slavery; its unlawfulness consists in 
imposing it on others: it is the infliction, not the una- 
voidable suffering, of an injury, which is wrong. 
| The practice of slavery in our colonies is a flagrant 
violation of the dearest natural rights of man. 

There are certain advantages, which are necessary 
to the well-being of man, and to the possession and en- 
joyment of which he is by nature entitled, as being the 
gift of the Creator: these are generally called the natu- 
ral rights of man: consequently, to deprive him of the 
enjoyment of these would be the infliction of a wrong, 
the commission of an act of injustice. Civil rights are 


those which man possesses as a member of society; and 
} 


142 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


which vary according to the peculiar laws and institu- 
tions of each separate community: but the natural 
rights of man are those which he possesses by nature; 
which are common to all human beings, and which are 
the same in every part of the world. The “rights and 
liberties” of man, as a member of society, “ are no oth- 
er,” says Blackstone, “than either that reszdwwm of nat- 
ural liberty which is not required by the laws of society 
to be sacrificed to public convenience; or else those 
civil privileges which society hath engaged to provide, 
in lieu of the natural liberties so given up by individu. 
als.’* The natural rights of man are, according to 
Paley, “A man’s right to his life, limbs, and liberty; 
his right to the produce of his personal labor; to the 
use, in common with others, of air, light, water. Ifa 
thousand different persons, from a thousand different 
corners of the world, were cast together upon a desert 
island, they would from the first be every one entitled 
to these rights.” | The fgreat lawyer already quoted, 
observes, that “The absolute rights of man, considered 
as a free agent, endowed with discernment to know 
good from evil, and with power of choosing those meas- 
ures which appear to him most desirable, are usually 
summed up in one general appellation, and denominated 
the nataral liberty of mankind. This natural liberty 
consists, properly in a power of acting as one thinks fit, 
without any restraint or control, unless by the law of 


* Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England. Ox- 
ford edition, 1765, vol. i. p. 125. 


t Paley’s Moral Philosophy, book ii. chap. 10. 


a 





LECTURE III, 143 


nature: being a right inherent in us by birth, and one 
of the gifts of God to man at his creation, when he en- 
_ dued him with the faculty of free will. But every man, 
_when he enters into society, gives up a part of his nat- 


ural liberty, as the price of so valuable a purchase ; 


_ and, in consideration of receiving the advantages of 


mutual commerce, obliges himself to conform to those 
Jaws which the community has thought proper to es- 
tablish.’’* A 

These rights, then, are antecedent to all law, that is, to 
all human enactments. Human laws may take them 
as their basis, may define and regulate them ; but they 
do not create them, and cannot destroy them. “Those 


rights which God and nature have established, and are 


therefore called natural rights—such as life and liber- 


 ty—need not the aid of human laws to be more effect. 
ually invested in every man than they are; neither do 


they receive any additional strength when declared by 
the municipal laws to be inviolable. On the contrary, no 
human legislature has power to abridge or destroy them, 


unless the owner himself shall commit some act which 
-amounts to a forfeiture.’+ In a state of society, it is 
obviously necessary that the exercise of these rights 
should receive some restrictions. As we give up a por- 
tion of the produce of our labor, to which we are natu- 


rally entitled, to procure the more certain enjoyment of 
the rest; so we give upa portion of that liberty, to 


* Blackstone’s Commentaries, vol. i. p. 121. 
+ Blackstone’s Commentaries, vol. i. p. 54. 


144 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


which we have an equal claim, that the rest may be 
better secured and more safely enjoyed. The perfection 
of all human laws is, therefore, to guarantee to all the 
greatest portion of their natural rights which is consist- 
ent with the well-being of society. ‘The first and 
primary end of all human laws is, to maintain and reg- 
ulate these absolute rights of individuals.” * 

Man, then, it is admitted by the highest authorities, 
has rights as the creature of God, as a, rational and ac- 
countable being, for the possession of which he is not 
indebted to others, and which no fellow-creature is au- 
thorized to deprive him of; and were any laws made 
to destroy them, those very laws would be criminal, as 
sanctioning a manifest injustice, and being in direct 
opposition to the laws of nature. 

There are, however, two ways in which, with cer- 
tain important limitations, these rights may be occasion- 
ally alienated—by voluntary consent, and as a punish- 
ment for crime. 

A man may, for important reasons which appear to 
him to justify the sacrifice, surrender the possession of 
some of his rights, for a term of years, or for his life ; 
but there are limits beyond which he is not authorized 
to go. For, first, the concession must include only him- 
self: it cannot extend to others; it cannot embrace his 
descendants, at least beyond the minority of his own 
children. That contract cannot be binding by which a 
man disposes of what he does not, and cannot, possess; 
it would be neither more nor less than giving away or 


* Blackstone’s Commentaries, vol. i. p. 120. 


LECTURE III. 145 


selling the property of others; and he that, on the pre- 


tence of such a gift or purchase, should take possession 
_of it, would be guilty of robbery. Nor can he make 


any such surrender of his rights as interferes with his 


_ moral agency, or is inconsistent with his duty to God. 
His responsibility cannot be made over to another: he 
may as well talk of assigning over his’interest in anoth- 





er world. No contract can bind him to act contrary to 
his conscience, or, when the commands of both are op- 
posite, to obey man rather than God. No engagement 


can be valid which prevents him from seeking his high- 


est happiness in this world and in that which is to 


come, since this is the very end of his being. He can 
not assign to another the unrestricted use of his body 


and limbs, or, which is the same, make them over as 


_the property of another: they must be his as long as he 
lives; he is responsible for the use of them. He cannot 
give away his life: he is accountable to God for this 


gift; from Him he received it, and only when He calls 


for it has he any right to surrender it. 


But as a member of society, in that social compact 


which binds together as one community all the individ- 
uals composing a state, it is understood to be stipulated 
that every person retains his own rights, only on the 


condition of not violating those of others. By that very 
act by which he injures the rights of others, he forfeits 


his own, in that way, and to that extent, which the laws 


of the community in which he lives may determine, 


And here also there are restrictions to be observed. 
~The forfeit must not exceed the wrong committed; the 
-Teparation to society must be such as justice sanctions, 


10 


146 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


and the nature of the case requires. The produce of 
the delinquent’s labor may be transferred to others; he 
may be deprived of his liberty; and, in the administra- 
tion of justice in most countries, the criminal, in some 
cases, forfeits his life. Whether any individual or com- 
munity has just authority to proceed to this extremity, I 
confess I have serious doubts; but certainly the punish- 
ment, of whatever kind it be, must be confined to the 
transgressor, it must not alight on the innocent: it would 
be subversive of all justice to extend it to unborn chil- 
dren, by depriving them of rights which they never for- 
feited. 

Now, apply these principles to our colonial slavery. 
The natural rights of man do not depend on the color 
of his skin, but on his possessing human nature, his be- 
ing a rational and accountable creature of God. And 
what has he done to alienate those rights which are in- 
herent in man? Has he madea contract with the slave- 
owner; has he voluntarily consigned himself, his lib- 
erty and labor, to another? This is not pretended. He 
was made a slave, and is kept a slave, by force; it is at 
the peril of his life that he attempts to snap a link of his 
chain, or loosen a single rivet of his fetters. What 
crime has he perpetrated that could justify so severe a 
doom, unless he be charged with the commission of 
treason against the majesty of the white man, by being 
born black? Whom has he murdered? where was the 
scene of his robberies and burglaries? when was he 
tried ? and who passed sentence upon him? He has 
been the sufferer, and not the aggressor; and yet we 


behold him spoiled of his rights, deprived of all that is 


LECTURE III. 147 


dear to man. His liberty is not abridged that it might 
be rendered more secure ; but it is gone; nota shred is 
left. The produce of his labor is not his own, his wife 
and children are not his own, his property in his own 
body and limbs is denied: his owner claims universal 
and unrestricted obedience. He must not think fora 
moment whether what he is enjoined be consistent with 
the will of God; he has nothing to do but with the will 
of his master: he must not reflect on the morality of an 
action—a slave must have no conscience! In fact, as 
far as lawless power can go towards it, he is deprived 
of the essential attributes of man: he is made a beast, 
with only so much of reason allowed him as will enable 
him to work his master’s pleasure. What spoliation, 
what robbery, what crime against property, to which 
the laws of England assign the most disgraceful and 
dreadful punishment, can equal this? Think not the 
language severe: [ know of no term sufficiently strong 
to express my abhorrence of a system which thus sac- 
tifices the most valuable interests, the dearest rights of 
man, to the lust of wealth and the love of domination. 
But the right, as far as a just title is concerned, still re- 
rains: every Negro in our colonies is entitled to his 
liberty, his limbs, the produce of his labor—to all the 
privileges of a man. He may be denied the possession 
and enjoyment of these advantages, but the right to 
possess and enjoy them cannot be taken from him. Not 
all the cruel codes of the Antilles, nor the statutes of the 
British Parliament, nor the force employed to make the 
bonds of his servitude firm, can extinguish it; and it 
will remain to condemn and to execrate the system, till 


148 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


the genius of Britain shall redress the Negro’s wrongs, 
and proclaim freedom through all her colonies. 

The patrons of slavery, however, attempt frequently 
to justify it, or at least to rebut the charge of wrong and 
injustice, by denying-all participation in the original act 
by which the Negroes were deprived of freedom. Long 
and stoutly did the colonists contend for the slave trade ; 
its dreadful evils and its crying injustice were as much 
denied as those of slavery are now; but since the Brit- 
ish legislature has abolished the nefarious trade, and 
only other nations participate in its cruel gains, even the 
planters are found joining in the hue and cry to hunt it 
down. The slave trade, in which they no longer en- 
gage, they condemn as iniquitous; but slavery itself is 
just and right. Whata miserable fallacy is this! We 
have already shown, that, as to the guilt incurred, they 
axe both identified.* The slave trade is felonious; and 
it was just as much so before the British Parliament 
pronounced it felony as since: it is one of those crimes 
which are styled mala in se, ‘which acquire no addi- 
tional turpitude by being declared unlawful by a human 
legislature.” +t But if it be felonious to make men 








* This point needs to be pressed upon the consciences of our 
countrymen. How much soever they may differ, in the circum- 
stances of their atrocity, there is no difference in principle or es- 
sence, between African kidnapping and American slave-holding. 
Let us not execrate the ignorant sailor, who, lured by high wages, 
goes to Africa and takes possession of his fellow-beings, while we 
exculpate the enlightened, accomplished gentleman at home, who 
buys or sells a man, or keeps possession of him as a piece of 
property —Am. Ep. 

+ Blackstone’s Commentaries, vol. i. p. 54. 


LECTURE III. 149 


_ slaves, is it less so to keep them slaves, and to make all 


their children slaves? If it be wrong to commit a theft, 


can it be right to retainthe stolen property. The slave 
_ trade was only the creature of slavery, and in some re- 


spects was the less evil of the two, as the agent is deem- 
ed less guilty than the principal. The rule holds here, 
Qui facit per alium facit per se. The retaining of 
them in bondage is but a continuation of the first out- 
rage. If it is wrong to imprison a man falsely, can his 
detention be less than an aggravation of the injury? If, 
therefore, the first act was robbery and injustice, it viti- 


~ates the whole tenure of possession: if the Negro was 


unjustly consigned to bondage, then he and his posterity 
are suffering wrong as long as this bondage continues, 


_and a wrong which is accumulating, instead of diminish- 
ing, by the course of years. Right and wrong, justice 


and injustice, are so essentially different, that no length 
of time can convert the one into the other. Ifthe first 
act, by which they were torn from their native land and 
deprived of all their rights, was unjust, the perpetuation 
of their wrongs can never become right—never— 
never. 

But it has been said, in apology for the system, that 
the slaves were originally captives taken in war, or 
criminals who had forfeited their liberty to the justice 
of their country; and that, being already in a state of 


slavery, the purchase was lawful, and the transfer even 


beneficial to the unhappy beings; that it was, in fact, an 


act of charity. But suppose they were all captives 
taken in war, or criminals doomed to slavery; do we 


150 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


think that captives are justly enslaved ?* that criminals, 
with their families and their relatives, and all their de- 
scendants forever, are justly consigned to this wretched 
fate for some such crime as witchcraft, and on such 
proof as that of the accused individual not being able to 
drink poisoned water with impunity? Shall men, 
therefore, of superior civilization, by purchasing those 
who are enslaved in this manner, sanction these cruel 
deeds, and encourage the perpetrators of them to pro- 
ceed in such a course? Shall men who call themselves 
Christians seal the doom of these unfortunate sufferers, 
and, by keeping them in slavery, justify the barbarity T 
which made them slaves? 


* Nothing more needs be said on this point, than was said by 
our own Judge Story, in his charge to the Grand Jury, in 1819. 
“The existence of Slavery under any shape is so repugnant to 
the natural rights of man, and the ‘dictates of justice, that it seems 
difficult to find for it any adequate justification. It undoubtedly 
had its origin in times of barbarism, and was the ordinary lot of 
those who were conquered in war. It was supposed that the con- 
queror had a right to take the life of his captive, and by conse- — 
quence might well bind him to perpetual servitude. But the 

position itself, on which this supposed right is founded, is not 
‘true. No man has a right to kill his enemy, except in cases of 
absolute necessity ; and this absolute necessity ceases. to exist even 
in the estimation of the conqueror himself, when he has spared 
the life of his prisoner. And even if in such case it were possi-- 
ble to contend for the right of slavery, as to the prisoner himself, 
it is impossible that it can justly extend to his innocent offspring 
through the whole line of descent.”—Am, Ep. 


t+ It has been frequently urged as a justification of Slavery, that 
it has always existed in the world, among one nation or another, 
from the commencement to the present time; and being the uni- 


LECTURE III: 151 


But the premises are not true: there is not even this 
pretence to plead. The slaves were not, for the most 
part, taken in war, unless by war we understand every 
piratical expedition for the purpose of making slaves, 
every plundering horde, every kidnapping ambush, and 
every attack of barbarous chiefs on their own unoffend- 
ing subjects, when they could not resist the tempting 
offers of the European slave-dealers. In fact, the whole 








versal practice of mankind it must be right. But two replies 
may be made to this mode of reasoning. One is, that it would 
go to sanction every vice and every evil which has ever existed 
in the world, as each of them has found supporters among some 
nations or communities through every successive period of the 
world. Intemperance, lotteries, the slave-trade, polygamy, infan- 
ticide, piracy, killing prisoners of war, and all other barbarities 
may be defended on this ground. The other reply is, that the 
same reasons, the practice of mankind, which are offered as jus- 
tifying slavery, will operate with equal force in favor of the cus- 
toms out of which it originated. Thus the persons who were 
made slaves or held in bondage were the individuals who were 
made captives in war, or were debtors who were unable to pay 
their debts, or persons who sold their children, or others, for a 
compensation. If, therefore, slavery can be sustained, the usage 
of making prisoners of war, debtors, and persons sold by others, 
slaves, can also be likewise sustained; in other words, the 
ameliorations which have been made in the laws of nations, and 
of individual states upom these points are in themselves wrong 
and unjust. Again, the argument will apply as well to white men 
as black, and to persons of every rank in society, and of every 
grade of intellect,—to generals, philosophers, statesmen, mer- 
chants, jurists, or clergymen. For they have all been made 
slaves by these usages formerly. Now, as no one would think of 
defending a position so evidently revolting as this last, it follows 
that the former which is built upon it must also fail—Am. Eb. 


152 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


system of continued warfare to which the slave trade 
gave rise, was that of fighting, burning, plundering, to 
obtain slaves. Every bold adventurer, who wished to 
enrich himself, turned man-stealer ; and, to complete the 
whole, the administration of justice became, in most 
cases, a mere pretence for making slaves, in order to 
obtain the articles which the slave-dealer offered in ex- 
change.* 

But, still, having been enslaved, it was an act of 
kindness to remove them from their own barbarous 
countrymen, and place them in the hands of Christian 
slave-owners.t—Taken from Africa in charity, to save 
them from greater miseries! Kind and- benevolent 
men, we were not aware of all your philanthropy! 
O happy slaves! the too thoughtless subjects of somuch 
mercy! Ye human live-stock, packed like bales of 
goods, and comfortably secured by fetters to the deck, and 
crammed below lest theairof heaven should breathe upon 
you, while the gallant ship dances over the waves, as 
though it participated in the joy of your deliverance! 
Why do you so inconsiderately groan, and faint, and 
become diseased, and die—wickedly die with grief, on 
your passage to all the felicities of a slave plantation! 
And you, who labor without reward, and toil without 
hope, in a colonial paradise, and see your children sold, 





* See “‘ Abstract of Evidence before the House of Commons,” 
already referred to: chap. i. “‘on the Enormities committed by 
the Natives of Africa on the Persons of one another, to procure 
Slaves for the Europeans.” . 


+ That slavery in Africa admits of much more comfort and — 
happiness than in our colonies, see chap. x. of the above a 


. 


LECTURE III. 153 


and your wives flogged, and are surrounded with all 

the emblems of happiness, the whips, and collars, and 
chains, and stocks; and you, ungrateful Negroes, who 

give your fiscals and protectors the trouble of stifling 
your groans, and teaching you contentment, by admin- 
istering bleeding stripes for your complaints,— you 
know not the charity of these White men, nor appreci- 
ate thetenderness of their compassion ! 
_ The last plea which I shall notice in this place is, 
_that the Negroes are of an inferior race, and are not 
entitled to the same usage as White men; and that, 
while it would be unlawful to hold Whites in slavery, 
itis right to enslave the Blacks!—But, admitting this 
inferiority, instead of justifying us in inflicting on them 
the miseries of slavery, it would give them a claim on 
| our compassion; unless, indeed, we could prove, as 
some have attempted, that they are brute animals sent 
for the use of man. Supposing that “the retreating 
forehead and depressed vortex” indicated mental inferi- 
ority* in the Negro, does it prove that he is not a hu- 


€ 









* The actual inferiority of the intellectual and moral organiza- 
tion of the negro tothe white man is not as yet satisfactorily set- 
tled. But even if it were admitted to be the fact, it would not con- 
| stitute a justification of slavery, unless it were proved they were not 
human beings, but brute animals, not having to any extent the 
intellectual, moral and social nature of man. It isa fact that among 
the white race, there is every degree of intellectual, moral and 
social organization, but this is not made a reason or even a pre- 
text, for reducing any portion of them to a state of slavery, or of 
depriving them of any of their political or social rights. They are 
permitted to follow those occupations and occupy that place in 

iety, for which their talents and taste qualify them, while their 


154 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


man being, that he has not an immortal soul, that he 
is not an accountable creature 2? Does it prove that 
he is not capable of every rational act, and every social 
feeling, which is essential to a man? Does it prove that 
the Negro race are less the children of “our Father 
who is in heaven,” or authorize us to refuse a practical 
recognition of their being a part of the human family 2* 

But I believe facts will bear me out in the assertion, 
that, whatever may be the prejudices of planters, or the 
ingenious theories of speculative men, there is not that 
characteristic inferiority in the Negro race which is 
sometimes imagined. That they are capable of all the 
benevolent and social feelings of our nature, is evident 





civil rights are the same with those of their more highly gifted 
brethren. So might it be with the colored race. Ifthey are not fit 
fer philosophers, statesmen, generals, or merchants, they might ne- 
vertheless, like a portion of the white race, be employed as laborers, 
operatives and artizans. This is upon the supposition that the whole 
black race, as a race, are inferior to the whole white race. But the 
fact is, that a large part of the black race are decidedly superior 
in organization to a large part of the white race, i.e. the highest 
grade of the former is superior to the lowest of the latter. Why 
then should not this portion of them enjoy the same rights with 
their white brethren, who fall below them in the scale of organi- 
zation 2—Am. Ep. 

* It isnot much to be wondered at that Mr. Long, in his 
‘‘ History of Jamaica,” should endeavor to prove that the Negro 
is more nearly allied to the ourang-outang than to man; or that 
many of the colonists at the present day should, as Mr. Bickell 
declares they do, “ look upon the Blacks as much beneath them- 
Selves as the brutes are beneath the Negroes:” it is quite necessa- 
ry to their own justification. ‘‘I] est impossible,” says Montes- 
quieu, “ que nous supposions que ces gens-la soient des hommes ; 


parceque si nous les supposions des hommes, on commenceroit 
\ . . 
a croire que nous ne sommes pas nous-mémes Chretiens.” 


LECTURE III. 155 


from the concurrent testimony of travellers and resi- 
dents in Africa, and even of many of the colonists them- 
selves. Instances can be produced in which a slave 
has hazarded his own life for the protection of a master 
by whom he has been treated with kindness. In the 
attempts which have been made to instruct Negro 
children in the United States, at Sierra Leone, and in 
the West Indies, the uniform conviction on the minds of 
those engaged in teaching them has been, that they are 
not inferior to European children, whenever they pos- 
sess the same advantages. The evidence beforea Se- 
lect Committee of the House of Commons, in 1790 and 
1791, of those who had visited the interior of Africa, 
and had seen their various manufactures, gives a most 
favorable idea of their ingenuity and industry.* Nor are 
there wanting instances in the Negro race of a power of 
intellect and loftiness of moral character which would be 
an honor to any human being. Are there not men of 
education and respectability in most or all of our colo- 
nies, who are free Blacks and persons of Color? Yes; 
and among this despised and persecuted race there 
have been instances of high attainments in literature, 
in science, and in theology: so that, considering their 
immense disadvantages, the wonder is, not that the num- 
ber of such is so small, but that there are any.t Have 


*« Abstract,” &c. chap. v° 


+ I beg leave to recommend to the perusal of the reader, “‘ Bio- 
graphical Sketches and interesting Anecdotes of Persons of Col- 
or, compiled by A. Mott;” and if any one can read these simple 
anecdotes of the Negro without deep emotions of pity, of admi- 
ration, and of thankfulness to Him who is “no respecter of per- 
sons,” I do not envy his feelings. 


156 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


there not been heroes, and politicians, and legislators in 
Hayti? Can the West India islands, since their first 
discovery by Columbus, boast a name that deserves 
comparison with that of Toussaint L’Ouverture? The 
very generation of Negroes that had been slaves, formed 
a scheme of government and showed a spirit of legis- 
lation which might put our colonial assemblies to the 
blush. 

Why then are we told of their vast inferiority, while 
kept in a state of degradation which renders mental 
and moral improvement almost impossible; which 
stints the growth of every thing that is generous and 
manly; which tends to destroy every spring of virtuous 
action, and to bring.a human being as nearly as possible 
tothe condition of abrute? How just is the remark of 
an intelligent traveller, who had an opportunity of ob- 
serving the effects of slavery: * ‘“ Cut off hope for the 
future, and freedom for the present; superadd a due 
pressure of bodily suffering and personal degradation; 
and you have a slave, who, of whatever zone, nation, 
or complexion, will be, what the poor African is, torpid, 
debased, and lowered beneath the standard of humani- 
ty.’ Loosen the shackles of the slaves; let them feel 
the invigorating influence of freedom; let hope enter 
their bosoms, and the prospect of reward cheer them; 
let them walk erect, like men; and they will soon re- 
fute the foul calumny of their great and inevitable infe- 
riority to those who have a white skin. That such a 


x * Lieutenant Hall, in his “ Account of Travels in the United 
tates.” bss? 


LECTURE III. 157 


state of hopeless and helpless bondage has a necessary 
tendency thus to degrade the mind, is evident from its 


_ effects on Europeans, as well as on Africans. “It was 


remarked by M. Dupuis, the British consul at Moga- 
dore, that even the generality of European Christians, 
after a long captivity and severe treatment among the 


_ Arabs, appeared at first exceedingly stupid and insensi- 


—_— —<— — —— es 





ble. ‘If,’ headds, ‘they have been any considerable 
time in slavery, they appear lost to reason and feeling ; 
their spirits broken ; and their faculties sunk in a spe- 
cies of stupor which I am unable adequately to describe. 
They appear degraded even below the Negro slave. 
The succession of hardships, without any protecting 
law to which they can appeal for any alleviation of re- 
dress, seems to destroy every spring of exertion or hope 
in their minds. They appear indifferent to every thing 
around them; abject, servile, and brutish.” * Since, 


then, the very condition of the Negro slaves sufficiently 
accounts for their apparent inferiority, it is unnecessary 
and unphilosophical to seek for any other cause. 


We ask, then, with confidence, do any of these worth- 


less pleas afford the shadow of a pretence for depriving 
the Negro of those rights which the God of nature has - 


given him, by keeping him in perpetual slavery? Do 


not they leave the accusation untouched? Is not the 
charge fully substantiated, that our colonial slavery is 





*“ An appeal to the Religion, Justice,{!and Humanity of the 


“Inhabitants of the British Empire in Behalf of the Negro Slaves 
in the West Indies,” by W. Wilberforce, Esq. pp. 47, 48 


158 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. , 


a flagrant and wicked violation of the dearest rights of 
man ? A). 
We advance another charge: it is contrary ‘to the 

spirit and practice of He British Constitution— —“ By 
constitution we mean,” says Lord Bolingbroke, “ when- 
ever we speak with propriety and exactness, that as- 
semblage of laws, institutions, and customs, derived 
from certain fixed principles of reason, rected to cer- 
tain fixed objects of public good, that compose the gen- 
eral system according to which the community hath 
agreed to be governed.” * And what is the great ob- 
ject of the British constitution? It is, to secure to every 
subject the enjoyment of his natural rights, as far as is 
consistent with the safety and welfare of the whole com- 
munity ; and the enjoyment of these is what we call free- 
dom or liberty. Because our system of laws and institu- 
tions is formed to secure this, we call it a free constitu- 
tion; and on this account it has been the admiration of 
foreigners and the glory of Britons. It is for this th 
all the apparatus of law and justice is provided, from 
the courts of Westminster Hall to the justice-room of 
the county magistrate; it is for this that the throne is 
erected, and the sovereign maintained in royal dignity 
as the great executive power; it is for this that both 
houses of Parliament meet, that the judges go their cir- 
cuits, and that every officer of justice is appointed, from 
the king to the constable; it is, indeed, for the accom- 
plishment of this object, in a manner more or less di- 
rect, that all the taxes of every kind are levied: what- 


* 


* Lord Bolingbroke’s Works, vol. ii. p. 130. 


LECTURE III. 159 


‘ever abuses may creep in, whatever anomalies may be 
7 detected, the whole frame of civil government is carried 
‘on with this view. "The “ rights of all mankind,’ says 
Blackstone, “in most other countries of the world being 
now more or less debased and destroyed, they at pres- 
vent may be said to remain, in a peculiar and emphatical 
manner, the rights of the people of England. And 
these may be reduced to three principal or primary ar- 
_ticles,—the right of personal security; the right of per- 
sonal: flibetty ; and the right of private property.” It 
was to secure the rights and liberties of British sub- 
jects that our ancestors struggled hard and long, and in 
the end successfully, in resisting the encroachments of 
arbitrary power. It was for this that Magna Charta 
was obtained, for this the Bill of Rights was passed, 
and for this the succession to the throne was fixed and 
limited.* For this object thousands have bled, moun- 
tains of treasure have been expended; and that their 
» liberties might not perish, a people naturally loyal took 
’ up arms against their sovereign. For this, was an 
hereditary monarch driven from the throne, and the 
house of Hanover called to occupy it. With whata 
jealous eye has every movement of government been 
watched by the people! How anxious have' they been 
to repair every defect of freedom which time and change 
may have produced in the constitution! Is there a 
session of parliament which passes without numerous 
petitions and debates on some points or other connect- 





* Were not the purposes of the Constitution of the United 
States at least as high and generous?—Am. Ep. 


160 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


ed with the liberty of the subject 1. The most memora- 
ble Act passed during the reign of George the Fourth, — 
are those which have given the full enjoyment of their 
civil rights to numerous bodies of people, on whom, on 
account of religious opinions, some restrictions were 
laid. | : 

Prompted by this love of freedom, how often have 
the British people not only manifested a sympathy with 
other nations, when groaning beneath oppression and 
tyranny, but have been absolutely prodigal both of their 
treasure and their blood, in order to assist them in shak- 
ing off the yoke! What a bust of feeling was produced. 
by the first effort of Spain to resist the tyranny of Na- 
poleon, and with what alacrity did the British armies 
fly to her aid! What sympathies were awakened 
throughout the nation when Greece ventured to assert 
her freedom; and with what transports of joy was the 
prospect of her liberation hailed! Why was it that the 
thunder of the British cannon rolled over the head of 
the proud Algerine, and shook his towers of defence to 
the dust ? It was not to obtain cessions of territory, nor 
to increase the revenue by foreign tribute, but it was’ to 
abolish slavery, and to set the captives free. With 
what a feeling of generous pride did every bosom swell 
when England was hailed as the liberator of Eu- 
rope ! 

But what a strange and glaring inconsistency is 
here! She sends her armies to Spain and Portugal, 
and her fleets to Algiers and Navarino, to break the 
arm of oppression, and to rescue foreigners from slave- 
ry; and she sends her armies and her fleets to the 


LECTURE III. 161 


West Indies to rivet the chains of slavery on her own 
subjects, and to bind fast the yoke of oppression! She 
has loaded herself with debt for the liberties of Europe; 
and she has added many millions to that enormous 
debt, to maintain slavery in her own colonies !—But, as 
something like an apology for what could not be de- 
fended on principle, it was asserted by a statesman, 
whose generous predilections in favor of liberty were 
apparently shackled by his politiaal connexions, that 
“in the colonies the Constitution has not full play.” 
If he had said it has not fair play, he certainly would 
have spoken the truth: its operation is full and free 
enough in favor of the White man; it is obstructed only 
to the disadvantage of the Black. Under the shadow 
of its protection, the planter and the slave-holder are 
willing to sit, but the unhappy Negro is forbidden to 
expect from it either shelter or repose. ‘To say that 
the Constitution has not full play in the colonies, is but 
little to the purpose: has it any existence there, or is it 
a dead letter? If it has there any being at all, is it not 
perpetually outraged by the practice of slavery? Here 
are 800,000 human beings, the great majority of the 
population, a large proportion of whom were born sub- 
jects of his Britannic majesty, who are suffering the 
most grievous wrongs, deprived of their dearest rights, 
in the name of the British people, and by the sanction 
of the British government! Does, then, the Constitu- 
tion authorize one British subject to make another Brit- 
ish subject a slave, and to keep him so? Or are we 
to be told, that, in any part of his Majesty’s dominions, 
there is a class of subjects to whom the Constitution af- 
11 


162 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


fords no more protection than to the brutes that perish? 
Was it not an express condition, in all the charters 
which empowered the colonies to make laws for them- 
selves, that “the laws and statutes to be made under 
them are not to be repugnant, but as near as may be 
agrecable to the laws and statutes of this our kingdom 
of Great Britain?” But no one will pretend that there 
is any agreement between the slave codes of the West 
Indies, and the laws and statutes of Great Britain. To 
compare them would be a burlesque, unless it were 
meant to show their mutual repugnance. heir object 
is exactly opposite ;.that of the one being to perpetuate 
slavery, and of the other to secure and regulate free- 
dom. 4 

In the laws of the British constitution, founded pro- 
fessedly on the laws of nature and the principles of jus. 
tice, one great object is ever kept in view, that the of 
fender only shall be punished, while the innocent 
is protected in the full enjoyment of his rights; but in 
the slave colonies we have the monstrous absurdity of 
crime sanctioned and innocence punished! Those who 
deprive their fellow-creatures of their rights, who forci- 
bly take from them their liberty and the produce of 
their labor, are permitted to triumph in their violence, 
and to justify their wrongs; while those who have com- 
mitted no crime, suffer one of the severest punishments, 
short of death, which man can inflict on man. If in 
England an innocent individual were committed to pris- 
on, or sent to the hulks for life, by some man of power, 
without any offence alleged, the whole nation would be 
In an uproar, and the walls of St. Stephen would re- 


LECTURE IIE. 163 


sound with execrations on the tyrant who had dared 
thus to treat a British subject; but in our colonies, with- 
out the least pretence of guilt, are British subjects de- 
prived of every right which is dear to man, and doomed 
to pains and penalties, compared with which, in many 
cases, the tread-mill would be a blessing, and Botany 
Bay a paradise! In fine, the slavery of our colonies 
is a mockery of all law, a contempt of all right, and a 
stigma of reproach on the British constitution, to which 
it is in the highest degree repugnant. 

If, however, there is any portion of the population of 
our colonies who cannot be considered as British sub- 
jects, and who are not, on that account, entitled to the 
benefits of the constitution; the law of nations, as appli- 
cable to foreigners, must apply to them. They either 
form a part of his Majesty’s subjects, or they do not; 
in the latter case they are aliens. And is there no law 
to regulate our conduct towards such? Are we at liberty 
to take away any man’s life, or property, or freedom, and 
to inflict on him what injury we please, because he is 
not a fellow-subject with us? Though no human 
enactments bind us, there are laws which “are founded 
in those relations of justice that existed in the nature of 
things antecedent to any positive precept. These are 
the eternal, immutable laws of good and evil, to which 
the Creator himself, in all his dispensations, conforms ; 
and which he has enabled human reason to discover, so 
far as they are necessary to the conduct of human ac- 
tions. Such, among others, are the principles, that we 
should live honestly, should hurt nobody, and should 
render to every one his due; to which three general 


164 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


precepts Justinian has reduced the whole doctrine of 
law.”* All these, as we have already seen, the slavery 
of our colonies violates in the most palpable manner. 
On the laws of nature, the jus gentium, or law of na- 
tions is founded; the great principle of which is, ac- — 
cording to Cicero, “that no one should injure another 
for the sake of his own advantage.” t+ This law, ac- 
cording to the modern and generaluse of the term, may 
be considered as a certain rule of action, recognized by 
all civilized states—especially by the various divisions 
of the European family—by which their conduct to- 
wards each other, and towards foreigners generally, is 
regulated, both in war and in peace. Now, in this un- 
derstood and generally recognized code, the following 
are articles: That no subjects of another state shall be 
forcibly injured, or made captives but in time of war ;— 
that no war shall be made or declared before a case of 
injury is made out ;—that captives shall not be barba- 
rously treated; and that their captivity shall not contin- 
ue longer than the war. But what have these foreign- 
ers done? Was there ever an injury alleged why 
war should be made on them? “The poor Negroes 
have only wept: they challenged to no combat; they 
had nothing to oppose to the strength of the violaters 
of their liberties, but the sighings of a broken heart, 
and the low murmurs of despair, lapsing into idio- 


* Blackstone’s Com. vol. i. p. 40. 


+ Cicero de Officiis, lib. iii. c. 5: “ Neque vero hoe solum na- 
tura, id est, jure gentium, sed etiam legibus populorum, quibus 
in singulis civitatibus respublica continetur, eodem modo con- 
stitutum est, ut non liceat sui commodi causa nocere alteri.” 


LECTURE III. 165 


cy.’* And yet they were made captives, and are held 
in bondage, and are treated with a rigor with which no 
European power could treat prisoners of war, and are 
doomed to wear out their lives in slavery, and to entail 
all the miseries of their condition on their posterity for- 
ever! I ask, then, in the name of humanity, in His 
name who made the black man as well as the white, 
why is this flagrant act of injustice committed? Why, 
if they are not as subjects entitled to the benefits of the 
British constitution, are these unoffending foreigners, in 
defiance of the law of nations, doomed to a degrading 
and perpetual slavery ? 

It is no justification of the practice to say, that it is 
generally prevalent; that France, and Spain, and other 
powers, have slavery in their dominions. We deeply 
lament the fact, but we cannot admit the plea. If oth- 
ers plunder and oppress, it is no reason that we should ; 
nor is it any excuse if we do. It is one of the worst 
and most unavailing pleas of a transgressor, that others 
have done thesame. The new states of South America 


are, however, shaming the old world, with all its boasted 


| 


superiority, and paying homage to justice, by the aboli- 
tion of slavery; + while Britain—free, generous, and 


_ enlightened Britain—retains it. — 


Nor is it of any avail to plead its antiquity. What 
vice is there, whether private or public, individual or 
national, which might not be excused by the admission 


* “Observations on the Demerara Memorial,” p. 39. 


+ What a stinging reproach is this upon the older states of 
North America!—Am. Ep. 


166 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


of such a plea? Whenever man has possessed the 
power to oppress his fellow-creatures, and to make them 
the instruments of his ownpleasure or profit, he has 
rarely failed to exercise it. Considerations of what is 
right and equitable have too little force, when opposed 
to the inclinations and passions of the human heart. 
Men will do wrong in the very face of punishment:” 
what, then, will check them when they are sure of im-. 
punity? The lawless abuse of power is almost as old 
as the creation; but it is not on that account less cri 
nal. What i Egypt, and Greece, and Rome, had 
slaves, are they to be our patterns? We are much in- 
debted to them for science, less for politics, and still less 
for morals. Shall the conduct of nations, to whose 
gods all human vices were attributed, whose morality 
had no fixed principles, on whom the light of Divine 
Revelation never shone, be pleaded in justification of 
those who live, not in the infancy, but at a very ad- 
vanced stage of the world’s improvement; and who, in 
addition to the light of science, have the superior ad- 
vantage of the Christian Revelation? Or, if slavery, in 
the mitigated form of villeinage, existed during the dark 
ages in England, surely it is no reason that the relics 
of a barbarous age should be revived, with increased 
severity, in our colonies, and be continued even in the 
nineteenth century ! 

The statutes of the British Parliament are sometimes 
pleaded ; but these, whatever they may be, do not prove 
that the practice is consistent with justice and humanity, 
and that it ought to be continued. Many laws have 
been repealed precisely for this reason, that they were 


LECTURE III. 167 


neither just nor humane; and we must repeat, that no 
law can make that right which is essentially wrong, 
any more than an Act of Parliament can make two and 
two five. ‘Too much stress is often laid on this circum- 
stance; especially when it is asserted, or insinuated, 
‘that colonial slavery is founded on British law. No 
“assertion can be more unjust. The Parliament has, in- 
deed, recognised it by its Acts as an existing institution; 
but it had its origin in the barbarous practice of unprin- 


_cipled adventurers. And little did the legislature or 


‘the people of England know of the monstrous evils of 
the system, when, by their commercial regulations, they 
inadvertently gave it the kind of sanction which is now 
pleaded in its favor. It was not until the conscience of 


_ the country was awakened by a view of the horrors of 
_ the slave trade, that all the cruelty and iniquity of colo- 


nial slavery became known. Had it been exhibited to 


_ our legislators, when seeking their protection, in its true 


colors, in all probability it would not have been coun- 
tenanced for a moment. As long, however, as any of 
those enactments remain, which, directly or indirectly, 
sanction what is so criminal in the sight of God, and 


so foul an injury to man, so long will they disgrace our 
_ statute book, dishonor the nation, and hold us up to the 


world as the most inconsistent people on the earth. 
When other resources fail, strange as it may appear, 
tthe Scriptures are quoted in favor of this cruel practice ; * 





* It is with an ill grace that slave-holders quote Scripture in 
defence of a system which is not only opposed to the great moral 


_ principles of the Bible, but which treats with contempt some of 


its most express precepts. There is, for instance, no command 


168 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


and it is argued, that as by Divine authority the ancient 
Jews were permitted to hold slaves, the highest possible 
sanction is given to the slavery of our colonies. Now 
there are two things which militate against this argu- 
ment: Jewish servitude and colonial slavery are so dis- 
similar that we cannot argue from one to the other; 
and, whatever was its condition among the Jews, it af- 
fords no precedent to us. 

It is needless now to refer to the temporary servitude 





more solemnly and forcibly enjoined than the observance of a 
seventh portion of time for religious purposes: ‘ Remember the 
Sabbath-day, to keep it holy. Szx days shalt thou labor, and do all 
thy work: but the seventh is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God: 
in it thou shalt not do any work; thou, nor thy son, nor thy 
daughter, thy man-servant, thy maid-servant, thy male slave, 
nor thy female slave, as the colonists would call it;) nor thy 
cattle, nor the stranger that is within thy gates.” (Ex. xx. 8—10.) 
This command remains in all its force; as to the portion of time 
to be thus employed, though under the Christian dispensation the 
day is altered. The only ground on which a slave-holder, whose ° 
slaves are compelled to break the Sabbath habitually, is entitled 
to appeal to the Scriptures, is the argumentum ad hominem ; it is 
because his opponents profess to revere them. Would it not be 
just to reply; ‘Your appeal is fruitless : itis toan authority which, 
in point of practice at least, you do not acknowledge. You treat 
the precepts of the Bible as of no authority: what right have you 
to plead its precedents? \1f the one has no authority as a rule, 
surely the other has none as a warrant. 

To affirm, indeed, that the Bible affords a sanction to West- 
India slavery, is, in my view, a gross libel on the Sacred Records 
—itis a most important and fatal concession to the infidel. _Prove 
only that it sanctions such injustice, cruelty, and oppression; 
that it supports the principle that power gives right, which is the 
basis on which the system stands; that it warrants one man to 
hold as his property a hundred or a thousand of his fellow-crea- 
tures, and, while he tramples on the dearest rights of man, to 
make them the mere instruments of his avarice and luxury; and 
you go far to prove that it does not proceed from a God of justice 
and mercy. To prove that the slave system of our colonies is 
Scriptural, is like an attempt to prove that the Bible is a forgery, - 
and its religion’a cheat. ee 


LECTURE III. 169 


to which an Israelite might, in certain cases, be subject: 
it is the bond-service of the heathen only which can be 


_ adduced by the advocates of slavery, in order to defend 


their system; and in this there are many important 
points of difference. Their servitude was altogether of 
a domestic character. The bondmen obtained by war, 
or by purchase, were incorporated into the family, and 
considered a part of it. Ifthey had to labor, it was in 


no occupation in which any of the household would 
have thought themselves degraded by taking a part. 


But who ever saw White men toiling on a plantation 


by the side of the Negroes? To employ even White 


convicts in this manner would be felt as an outrage on 
the whole community. The labor of the slave on the 
sugar-estate, urged by the driving-whip, with the super- 
added toil of crop-time, is such as no free man or hired 
servant, according to the colonists, could be induced to 
undergo, and nothing but constant “steady coercion” 
would keep the Negroes subjected to it. But there was 
nothing like planting speculations among the Hebrews, 
to enrich a few, by wearing out the lives of thousands 
in unremitting toil and hopeless misery. 

There was no broad line of distinction between the 
Hebrew servant and the family of which he formed a 
part. “The heir,’ says St. Paul, “as long as he is a 
child, differeth nothing from a servant (dsios, the term 
for ‘a slave,’) though he be lord of all.’ * Can this be 
affirmed of the West-India slave and his young lord? 
—A Hebrew servant might fill the highest offices, con- 





* Gal. ivak 


170 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


nected with the family, of trust and honor; and, if of 
approved fidelity and good conduct, he might expect the 
kindest regards and most ample remuneration. “A 
wise servant shall have rule over a son that caus- 
eth shame, and shall have part of the inheritance among 
the brethren.” * The wealthy patriarch, Abraham, had 
also designed to make a servant of this kind his heir. 
What would be thought of such thingsin our colonies? 
A man who should communicate his intention of giving 
to a trusty slave “part of the inheritance among the 
brethren,” or of leaving to him the whole of his fortune, 
would be deemed insane. 

If the servant of an Israelite lost but a tooth through 
the violence of his master, he was free; but when a ruf 
fian of one of our colonies boasted, that, in addition to a 
horrible flogging, he had “ broken the eit ” of a poor 
female slave, there was no redress: she was sent home, 
to be again subject to the same treatment. 

Our translators have done well in avoiding the terms 
“slave,” and “slavery,” with reference to the purchased 
servants of the Hebrews: they felt that in so rendering 
it they would have done injustice to the sacred text, by 
suggesting ideas which the words were not meant to 
convey. A s/ave, in the colonial sense, signifies some- 
thing more than a perpetual servant—it includes all 
that is degraded, and abject, and helpless. The term 
could not be applied to a free man, especially to a man 
of respectability, but in contempt, and it would be imme- 
diately resented as such. Among the Hebrews it had 


’ 





/ 


* Prov. xvii. 2. 


LECTURE III. 171 


no such necessary and inevitable associations: it is ap- 
plied to Israel as a nation, to prophets, to kings, and 
even to the Great Messiah.* If it had some ideas in 
common, it had many in which there was no agreement. 
Long, long, must the colonial assemblies go on with 
their “ meliorating acts,’ before they can compare their 
wretched slavery with the servitude of the Hebrews. 
And when they have brought it to this point, they will 
_be as far as ever from being able to justify the enslaving 
_of their fellow-creatures by the example of the ancient 
Jews. 

We observe, then, in the next place, that whatever 
was the nature of slavery or servitude among the Jews, 
it has no authority as a precedent for us. For, first, 
many of the institutions of Moses were evidently adapted 
to a people in the very infancy of civilization: we are 
in a situation so different, that what was allowable in 
them, might be culpable in us. And, further, some 
things, respecting which regulations were given, seem 
to be tolerated for the time being, rather than sanctioned 
and approved. Such was the case with polygamy, 
which might be defended on the same principle as 
slavery. 

_ And let it also be remembered, that the Jews lived 
under a special and peculiar dispensation; no nation 





__ * It may, I think, be safely said that the Hebrews had no word 
in their language for slave, in the full meaning of the West-In- 

dian term. The same may be observed of the Greek of the New 
Testament, as the sacred writers appearto use d#doc¢ in the same 
general sense, as signifying a person who renders service of 
any kind to God or man. 


1¢2 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


ever was, or ever can be, in similar circumstances, 
They were raised up asa nation for purposes which 
have long since been accomplished, and therefore for 
reasons which no longer exist. They were to be the 
depositaries of Divine truth and religious ordinances, 
while error and idolatry were covering the whole earth; 
they were to preserve the knowledge and the worship 
of the true God, until the appearance of the great Mes- 
siah to bless the Gentile world. Their civil polity was 
a theocracy: God was their king and their law-giver; 
he dwelt among them, by the visible emblem of his 
presence, the cloud of glory. These peculiarities gave 
them an importance which distinguished them from all 
other people; they were ‘‘a kingdom of priests, and a 
holy nation.” They were raised up not only for mer- 
cy, but for judgment: they were the rod of God's anger, 
the scourge of the guilty nations of Canaan. When 
God saw that the measure of their iniquity was full, he 
gave the Israelites commission to march through the 
wilderness, to enter the land of Canaan, to put the in- 
habitants thereof to the sword, and to take their coun- 
try as an inheritance. Nothing buta divine commission 
would have authorized this. All the surrounding’ na- 
tions were therefore under sentence of death; a sentence 
passed by the great Judge of all for long-continued na- 
tional crimes. Their being reduced to the state of 
bondsmen was therefore a mitigation of punishment, 
and might, by finally incorporating them with the: fa- 
vored nation, be an eminent blessing to them and their 
posterity. But will our colonists set up a claim of dis: 
tinction like that which the ancient Israelites possessed ? 


LECTURE IIIf. 173 


“The middle wall of partition is broken down,” and all 
nations and people are now on a level before God. 
Have they received a commission from Heaven to ex- 
tirpate or enslave the Negro race? We have just as 
good a precedent for making conquests of foreign na- 
tions, and putting their inhabitants to the sword, as the 
planters have for slavery.—But are they willing to abide 
by the regulations of the Mosaic institutes? ‘“ He that 
stealeth a man and selleth him, or if he be found in his 
hand, he shall surely be put to death.”* The sabbath 
breaker was stoned to death: if this law were put in 
force, what would become of our colonies? 

It would probably be replied, that the constitutions of 
the Jewish code are no longer in force; that the whole 
frame of that economy has passed away. We admit it; 
and with the admission we see the argument perish 
which is founded on Jewish servitude. All that was 
national and ceremonial is gone, and only what was of 
moral, and therefore of unchangeable, obligation is in- 
‘corporated in the new dispensation. A new system 
was introduced by the Son of God, of clearer light, and 
‘characterized by a purer morality and a more diffusive 
benevolence, the motto of which is, “ Glory to God in 
the highest, and on earth peace, good will towards men.” 

We shall not find it difficult, then, to show, in the 
last place, that the slavery of our colonies is opposed to 
the spirit and tendency of Christianity. And on this we 
would be content to rest the whole issue of the case. 
And why should it not rest here? The planters pro- 





* Exod. xxi. 16, 


174 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


fess Christianity; the government is declared to be 
Christian; we are told that “ Christianity is part and 
parcel of the Jaw of the land;” both Houses of Parlia- 
ment have Christian worship before they proceed to 
business: if, therefore, the slavery of our colonies be 
opposed to the principles and practice of Christianity, 
why shoulda Christian nation continue it, or suffer it to 
be continued, in any of its dependencies ? 

But that we may not be accused of unfairness, let us 
make all the concessions which can justly be claimed. 
And, first, it is admitted that there is no distinct precept 
in the Christian Scriptures which forbids slavery, of 
one kind or another. But neither is there any warrant 
for it; and so far nothing is proved on either side. 
There are many things, which are not by any express 
precept forbidden, which yet are quite irreconcilable 
with the holy and benevolent nature of the religion of 
Christ. In the absence of either precept or prohibition, 
we must judge of the propriety of any action or course 
of conduct by the bearing which Christian principles 
have on it; by its accordance or otherwise with the 
general nature and spirit of the system. Now, slavery 
is SO opposite to the general tendency of Christianity, 
that it would require some very express warrant, at 
least something more than mere negative authority, to 
support it.* 


* What would St. Paul have thought of the manner in whieh 
slaves were procured for our colonies, who ranks “ men-stealers ” 
among murderers of fathers, and murderers of mothers, and oth- 
er atrociouscriminals? A ‘“ man-stealer” (ardgamodicat) means 
one who kidnapped others and reduced them to slavery. 


LECTURE III. fa 


It is also true, that when Christianity commenced 
its mild and merciful career, slavery existed in every 
part of the Roman empire; and though many slaves, 
and masters of slaves, embraced Christianity, yet the 
Apostles did not explicitly declare this state to be un- 
lawful, nor command the immediate release of every 
slave. There were, however, very important reasons 
for this. The statement of Paley is so satisfactory on 
this point, that I beg leave to quote his words: —‘ Chris- 
tianity, soliciting admission into all the nations of the 
world, abstained, as behoved it, from intermeddling with 
the civil institutions of any. But does it follow from 
the silence of Scripture concerning them, that all the 
civil institutions which then prevailed were right ? or 
that the bad should not be exchanged for better? Be- 
sides this, the discharging of slaves from all obligation 
to obey their masters, which is the consequence of pro- 
nouncing slavery to be unlawful, would have had no 
better effect than to let loose one half of mankind upon 
the other. Slaves would have been tempted to embrace 
a religion which asserted their right of freedom; mas- 
ters would hardly have consented to claims founded up- 
on such authority; the most calamitous of all contests, 
a bellum servile, might probably have ensued, to the re- 
proach, if not the extinction, of the Christian name.’’* 
As, however, the influence of this system of mercy was 
extended, “the Greek and Roman slavery, and since 
these, the feudal tyranny, has declined before it.” Tf 





* Paley’s Moral Philosophy, book iil. part ii. ch. 111. 
+ The same argument which would support slavery, would 


176 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


It is granted, also, that servants (detor) are exhorted 
“to be obedient to their masters,” and “to show all good 
fidelity.” Such are still the exhortations of every Chris- 
tian missionary; and such is the conduct of the poor 
enslaved Negroes who have heard and embraced the 
Gospel. But why is this submissive conduct urged on 
the slaves? Not on account of the just claims of the 
master, but to take away every cause of reproach on 
the Gospel; “that they may adorn the doctrine of God 
our Savior in all things.” It was never imagined that 
it is incompatible with Christianity that a man should 
meekly suffer wrongs for which there is no redress, or 
that he should even decline asserting his rights “ for 
conscience sake ;” but the question is, whether Chris- 
tianity justifies the infliction of such wrongs, as abject 
and hopeless slavery implies ? 

The genius and tendency of the Christian religion 
may be ascertained by a brief reference to the views 
which it imparts, the dispositions which it inculcates, 
and the duties which it enjoins. 

Are the views which it gives us of God and man, 
and of our relations to each, such as can lend any sane- 
tion to the practice of enslaving, or holding in a state of 
slavery, our fellow-creatures? It leads our minds to 
the contemplation of an infinitely glorious Being, who 
is-as good as he is great; whose justice is such, that 





justify the most cruel despotism. Did St. Paul denounce Nero 
and that form of government, which had become so unqualified 
_a despotism as utterly to despise all popular rights? But who 
would argue from: his silence that Christianity gives a sanction 
to tyranny, and exonerates those who destroy theliberties of 
mankind ? 


LECTURE III. 177 


not an individual, of whatever rank in the scale of ex- 
istence, of all the unnumbered myriads that have had 
and shall have a being, shall have to complain of an in- 
jury done to him; whose benevolence is boundless as 
the universe, and lasting as eternity. He is represent- 
ed as the Creator of all, black or white, bond or free ; 
the common Parent of all mankind; to whom all may 
address the language, “ Our Father, who art in heav- 
en.” He is the Benefactor of all: He has created the 
world, and formed all the arrangements of nature for 


the benefit of mankind. The sun shines, the winds 


blow, the rains descend, the earth produces, for the A fri- 
can as well as for the European. He is the Governor 
of all; “‘ His kingdom ruleth over all.” All are bound 


_ to obey and serve Him: none can claim an indepen- 


) 
*) 


j 


| 


{ 


dence: He holds all responsible, of every rank, and 
color and clime. ' He will be the Judge of all. Poor 
and rich, princes and people, the planter and the Negro; 
all must stand before his tribunal, to be judged, not ac- 
cording to the color of their skin, but, according to their 
works.” Can such views, and the sentiments which 
they are adapted to produce, accord with slavery ? 

And what does Christianity teach us with reference 
toman? That we are all sprung from one common 
stock, whatever changes a difference of climate, and 
food, and manner of living may have produced ;—that 
whether the hair be woolly or lank; the skin black, or 
red, or white; whatever be the protuberances of the 
skull, the shape of the nose, or the position of the cheek 
bones; “ God hath made of one blood all nations of 
men.” It abolishes all national distinctions, and de- 

12 


oe 


oe 


* 


178 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


clares that we are all brethren, forming part of one 
great family, of which the Creator himself is the head. 
That, as all are born in the same way, grow in the 
same way, and alike descend into the dust; so the bodies 
of all shall be revivified, when “the trumpet shall sound 
and the dead shall be raised.” What then is the essen- 
tial difference, that one man should buy and sell a fel- 
low-man, or claim an. absolute property in a human 
being ? 

And as Christianity recognises no difference in the 
physical nature of man, so it admits not of a moral dis- 
tinction.— Does it allow the White man to suppose that 


he is free from that inherent depravity which it ascribes 


to all? Does the charge of transgression apply less to 
him than to the Negro? It contains no exemption in 
favor of the European or the slave-owner, when it de- 
clares that “all have sinned and come short of the glory 
of God;” that “except a man be born again, he cannot 
see the kingdom of God.” Its address.to all, without 
exception, is, ‘‘ Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise 
perish.” 

And do not the merciful provisions of the Gospel ex- 
tend to the Black as well as to the White, to the un- 
civilized as well as to the polished? Is there one Re- 
deemer for the planter, and another for his slave? 
Must not the sins of both be pardoned by the same 
atoning sacrifice? Does the Divine Spirit disdain to 
yisit the bosom of the Negro, or to purify his heart, be- 
cause of the color of his skin? All the promises and 


- Invitations of the Gospel are as much addressed to the 


slave as to his master. The same sources of consola- 


= <£_ <r 


LECTURE III. 179 


tion are open to all; the same enemy tempts all; the 
same grace is sufficient for all; and the same heaven 
will bless and reward every humble follower of the Sa- 
viour, whether he be black or white. “They shall 
come from the east, and the west, and the north, and 
the south ; and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, 
and Jacob, in the kingdom of God.” 

Now, are these views consistent with that state of 
degradation to which one man reduces another when 
he makes him a slave; and when the substance of all 
he can allege is, that he is a White man and the other 
is a Negro? We do not wonder that the planters are 
so jealous of their slaves’ receiving Christian instruc- 
tion; that missionaries are obliged to be so cautious 
and select even in the parts of Scripture which they 
read; that it is, in fact, almost impossible for the most 
prudent and cautious teacher of Christianity, who 
wishes to give efficient instruction to the Negroes in 
the doctrines and duties and privileges of Christianity, 
to avoid the charge of making “ statements which lead 
to insubordination,” giving ideas of equality which are 
inconsistent with the relation of slave and slave-owner. 
The planters feel how contrary their system is to Chris- 
tianity. They are afraid of their slaves hearing any 
thing of it, except its outward forms, and its precepts 
of obedience to masters ; and it requires no foresight to 
predict, nor is it rashness to assert, that the colonists 
never will, and never can be, generally and thoroughly 
in earnest to christianize their slaves, till they make up 
their minds to the speedy abolition of slavery. A pious 


\ 


180 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


slave will not have recourse to violence, but slavery 
cannot endure the light of Christianity. 

The dispositions which the Gospel of Christ incul- 
cates militate no less against slavery. It teaches us, 
that love is the life and soul of all religion: “ He that 
loveth not, knoweth not God; for God is love.” Love 
to God, and love to man, ever attend the reception of 
genuine Christianity—a supreme regard to God, and a 
benevolent regard to man. “He that loveth not his 
brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God, 
whom he hath not seen?” Nor is the measure of it to 
be small: “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.” 
What a delightful portraiture is drawn of charity by the 
same Apostle that condemns “ man-stealing!” It “suf- 
fereth long, and is kind:” it cannot, therefore, delibe- 
rately injure. So far from doing evil to another, it 
“thinketh no evil.” It is not selfish, looking only to 
personal gains and gratifications, but it expands the 
heart with a disinterested generosity; “ seeking not 
her own.” And so deeply does this charity enter into 
the nature of Christianity, that a man possessed of heay- 
enly gifts and miraculous powers, without it would be 
but “as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal.” How 
constantly are we, in the writings of the New Testa- 
ment, moved to ail that is merciful and kind, both by the 
infinite benevolence of our common Father, and by the 
example of the blessed Redeemer! For “if God so 
loved us, we ought also to love one another.” We are 
to forbear and to forgive; to be “tender-hearted;” to 
“weep with them that weep, and to rejoice with them 
that rejoice.’ And can this tenderness of charity, with 


LECTURE III. 181 


all its holy sympathies, be reconciled to the practice of 
our colonial slavery ? 

We lastly mention the duties which it enjoins. All 
the rules of conduct which it prescribes, in relation to 
our dealings with our fellow-men, may be summed up 
in a brief precept of the Old Testament, “ Do justly and 
love mercy.” Justice must be rendered to every one; 
but not merely justice; mercy must mark our conduct. 
Every thing like oppression, injustice, or want of kind 
consideration, is reprobated in the strongest terms. 
But, is it doing justice to withhold the “ hire of the la- 
borer ;” to deprive him of his right to his person, to his 
liberty, to the produce of his industry? to deprive him 
of the rights of a husband and a father? Is there mer- 
cy in any part of theslave system? Has it one feature 
of tenderness and charity? Without multiplying ex- 
amples, there is one general rule, which we shall finally 
mention, which, for its importance and value, has been 
called “the golden rule:” “ Ail things whatsoever ye 
would that men should do to you, do ye even so to 


them.” If we are in doubt as to the rule of duty in any 
given case, if there is no express and distinct precept 


which applies, here is a standard by which the most il- 
literate may determine: let,self-love pass the sentence 
and decide the point. This is a rule the application of 


which slavery cannot endure. When the planters adopt 
this principle, slavery will be no more. When the 
British Parliament act upon the plain and undeniable 


tule of that Christianity which they say is “part and 


parcel of the law of the land,” they will no longer bal- 


ance financial or commercial considerations against the 


182 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


rights and comforts of 800,000 of their fellow-creatures ; 
they will no longer allow the petty legislatures of the 
dependent colonies to mock them by evasive laws; but, 
with the generosity and sympathy of British Christians, 
they will “bind up the broken in heart, and bid the cap- 


tive go free.” 


LECTURE IV. 


Tue last topic of discussion to which I shall now 
proceed, is THE ABOLITION oF SLAVERY; as an in- 
troduction to which, permit me to give a brief view of 
the manner in which this deadly plant took root in our 
colonies. We have already had occasion to notice the 
general prevalence of slavery, in some form or other, 
from the remotest times. It may be considered, indeed, 
as co-existent with the exercise of lawless power, and as 
originating in the barbarous practices of men who acted 
on the principle that power gives right. Under the be- 
nign influence of Christianity, Juster views of the rights 
of man were acquired, and a tone of feeling produced by 
which that kind of slavery which prevailed in Europe 
for ages had given way, and in most of its states had 
become extinct; when in the fifteenth century it was 
revived, in an aggravated form, in the colonies of the 
new world. “In the year 1442, while the Portuguese, 
under the encouragement of their celebrated Prince 
Henry, were exploring the coast of Africa, Anthony 
Gonsalez, who two years before had seized some Moors 


184 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


near Cape Bajador, was by that prince ordered to carry 
his prisoners back to Africa: he landed them at Rio del 
Oro, and received from the Moors, in exchange, ten 
Blacks and a quantity of gold dust, with which he re- 
turned to Lisbon.” * This new kind of commerce ap- 
pearing to be a profitable speculation, others of the same 
nation soon embarked in it. Towards the close of the 
same century, the Spaniards, having discovered and 
taken possession of the West India islands, in their in- 
ordinate thirst for gold compelled the unfortunate natives 
to work in the mines of Hispaniola; and, according to 
Mr. Clarkson, “as early as 1503 a few slaves were sent 
by the Portuguese to the Spanish colonies.” In 1511, 
Ferdinand the Fifth of Spain, allowed a larger importa- 
tion of these unhappy beings. Such werethe cruelties 
which the natives of these newly discovered colonies 
suffered, while compelled to the severest labors by their 
avaricious oppressors, that their diminishing numbers 
threatened a speedy extinction of their race; when Bar- 
tholomew de Las Casas entreated Cardinal Ximenes, 
who held the reins of government till Charles the Fifth 
ascended the throne, to allow a regular commerce in 
African Negroes: this, however, the cardinal, much to 
his honor, refused. But in 1517, Charles the Fifth 
granted a patent for the!exclusive supply of 4,000 Ne- 
groes annually to Hispaniola, Cuba, Jamaica, and Por- 
to Rico. This patent was afterwards assigned to some 
Genoese merchants; and thus the Spanish colonies 
were regularly supplied. This great prince was not, in 





*“ Edwards’ History of the West Indies,” vol. ii. p. 37. 


LECTURE IV. 185 


all probability, aware of the dreadful evils attending this 
horrible traffic, nor of the crying injustice of permitting 
it; for in 1542, when he made a code of laws for his 
Indian subjects, he liberated all the Negroes, and by a 
word put an end to their slavery. When, however, he 
resigned his crown, and retired into a monastery, and 
the minister of his mercy, Pedro de la Gasca, returned 
to Spain, the imperious tyrants of these new dominions 
returned to their former practices, and fastened the yoke 
on the suffering and unresisting Negroes. 

Captain, afterwards Sir John Hawkins, was the first 
Englishman who disgraced himself and his country by 
engaging in this nefarious traffic. Conceiving that it 
_ would bea profitable speculation, he obtained the assist- 
ance of some wealthy persons in London; and in 1562, 
having fitted out three ships, and sailed to the coast of 
Africa, he fell on the defenceless Negroes sword in 
hand, burned and plundered their towns, and, seizing 
on 300, sailed with them to Hispaniola; sold them; and 
with other articles of merchandize, the price of blood, 
arrived in England.* He was afterwards appointed to 
one of the Queen’s ships, to proceed on the same ad- 
venture. But Elizabeth appears to have been deceived ; 
“for,” says Hill, the naval historian, quoted by Clark- 
son, having questioned Hawkins, “ she expressed her 
concern lest any of the Africans should be carried off 
without their free consent, in which case she declared 


* This atrocious act, the commencement of the English slave- 
_ trade, was perpetrated at Sierra Leone, on the very spot where 
_ Free-town now stands, erected with the design of repairing in 
some measure the wrongs of Africa. 


186 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


that ‘it would be detestable, and call down the ven- 
‘geance of Heaven upon the undertakers.’””* It seems, 
then, that it was represented to the government at home 
that it was as laborers, taken away voluntarily, that they 
were transported to the Spanish colonies, and not as 
slaves. | 

It appears also from Labat, a Roman missionary, that 
in order to induce Louis XIII. to sanction the practice 
of slavery in his colonies, he was persuaded that it was 
for the good of the Negroes’ souls and the glory of God, 
this being the only way of converting them to Chris- 
tianity. Deceived by this hypocritical representation, 
the monarch gave his consent. 

Having thus commenced, this shameful traffic pro- 
ceeded, and gathered strength day by day. As British 
settlements were formed in the West-India islands, dur- 
ing the reign of the two Charleses, the colonists com- 
menced plantations and stocked them with slaves. The 
Buccaneers enriched these settlements with their spoils, 
and, accustomed as they were to deeds of blood, to cru- 
elty and rapine, the enslaving of their fellow-creatures 


* What, then, would Elizabeth have said, had she known the 
depredations of this fiend in human shape? A companion of 
Captain Hawkins in this expedition, speaking of their arrival at 
Sambula, says, ‘in this island we stayed certain days, going ev- 
ery day on shore to take the inhabitants, with burning and spoiling 
their towns.” And Mr. Edwards, though averse to the abolition 
of the slave-trade, says, “in regard to Hawkins himself, he was, 
I admit, a murderer and a robber. His avowed purpose in sailing 
to Guinea, was to take, by stratagem or force, and carry away, 
the unsuspecting natives, in the view of selling them as slaves to 
the people of Hispaniola. In this pursuit his object was present 
profit; and his employment and pastime, devastation and murder.” 
(Edwards’ Hist. W. Indies, vol. 11. pp. 43, 44.) 


| 


| 


LECTURE IV. 187 


would shock no feeling of their minds.—Mr. Edwards 
says, that from 1700 to 1786 the number imported into 
Jamaica was 610,000! “TI say this,” he observes, “on 
sufficient evidence, having in my possession lists of all 
the entries.” ‘The total import into all the British 
colonies from 1680 to 1786, may be put at 2,130,000.” 
In 1771, which he considers the most flourishing peri- 
od of the trade, there sailed from England to the coast 
of Africa one hundred and nine-two ships, provided for 


_ the importation of 47,146 Negroes. “ And now,” he ob- 


serves (1793,) “the whole number annually exported 
from Africa by all the European powers is 74,000, of 
which 38,000 are imported bythe British.” * In this 
abominable traffic in human beings, Britain did not 
take the lead, but, having once embarked in it, she 


threw into it her accustomed energy, and soon surpass- 


ed all the rest. 

Thus we see that Mammon, at whose shrine the orig- 
inal natives of the West-India islands were sacrificed by 
thousands and tens of thousands, was the cruel deity by 
whose inspirations Negro slavery was commenced: 


_ fraud and hypocrisy pleaded his cause, while treachery 


and violence were the agents he employed. Unprinci- 
pled adventurers, for the love of gain, embarked in this 
unholy enterprise; governments, imposed on, or not 
aware of the enormities of the system, first tolerated 
and then encouraged it, till long custom gave it a kind 
of sanction; and this horrid upas, blighting and wither- 
ing all that comes within its pestilential influence, 


* Edwards’ History of the West Indies, vol. ii. pp. 55, 56, 57. 


188 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


struck deep root in our colonies: there it still flourish- 
es, the black man’s plague, and the white man’s curse; 
and will continue its mischiefs, till it is uprooted by hu- 
man benevolence, or perishes, smitten by the vengeance 
of offended Heaven. 

On taking a survey of what has been done by the 
friends of humanity towards the extinction of this evil, 
we perceive three distinct steps of advance :—the deci- 
sion of the judges in Westminster Hall in 1772, which 
banished Negro slavery from England; the Act of 
Parliament passed in 1807, which abolished the slave 
trade; and the unanimous resolutions of the House of 
Commons in 1823, which pledged Parliament to the 
extinction ofslavery. ‘These are three prominent points, 
which may serve as way-marks, and which convenient- 
ly divide our historical notices into four periods, from 
the commencement of slavery in our colonies to the 
present time. | 

The first long and gloomy period extends to 1772, 
when a ray of hope faintly beamed on the enslaved Ne- 
gro. During the whole of this time slavery reigned 
uncontrolled; the savage demon exulted in the triumph 
obtained over the cries of nature, the voice of conscience, 
and the remonstrances of religion. From the very cen- 
tre of Africa to the shores of America, on the land and 
on the ocean, was one vast scene of suffering. Bar- 
barities without a parallel were perpetrated constantly 
and systematically. Men seemed to have lost their own 
nature, and to be converted into fiends: not only did a 
hard-hearted selfishness extinguish all sense of human- 
ity, but a horrid taste for cruelty, a delight in gratuitous 


LECTURE IV. 189 


suffering, were in many cases generated by this sys- 
tem. In our colonies, deeds of darkness were perpetra- 
ted undisturbed by the light. No one had lifted the 
curtain; only the planters and their friends had been 
behind the scenes: with the exception of a few individ- 
uals, the British public knew nothing of what was go- 
ing on in the West Indies. During the whole of this 
time, the colonial assemblies legislated according to 
their own hearts’ desire. The slave owners had almost 
unlimited power to beat and torture and mutilate, even 
kill, their wretched Negroes, with only, in most cases, 
the risk of a small fine; and this risk, from the non- 
reception of slave evidence and the state of society, 
there was but little danger of incurring In certain 
cases, the miserable Negroes might be burned to death 
_by a slow fire, or hung up in a cage to perish by starv- 
ation. ‘The evidence given subsequently before the 
House of Commons exhibits a mass of suffering at which 
the heart sickens, but of which the people and govern- 
ment of England were then ignorant. Such was the 
dreadful waste of life, that large annual importations 
were necessary to keep up the number of slaves. And 
this triumphant and unmolested reign of slavery in the 
British dominions, continued for upwards of a century 
‘and a half. 

As far, however, as the true nature of the system was 
known, it was, from its earliest history, reprobated by 
the wise and good. We have seen that Ximenes set 
his face against it; that Charles the Fifth repented of 
the sanction which he had given it in the earlier part 
of his reign, and as the fruits of this repentance libera- 


190 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


ted all the slaves in the Spanish colonies; that Eliza- 
beth protested against any violence being employed; 
that Louis the Thirteenth admitted it only on the sup- 
position that it would facilitate the conversion of the Ne- 
groes. The first person in England, who, as we can 
now learn, bore his public testimony against Negro 
slavery, was a clergyman of the name of Godwyn, 
who published.a treatise on the subject, dedicated to the 
Archbishop of Canterbury. About the same time, Mr. 
Baxter, an eminent Nonconformist, reprobated, in his 
“Christian Directory,” the cruelties practised towards 
the Negroes; and some other writers followed in the 
same track. This was in the seventeenth century; in 
the following century several travellers, poets, and di- 
vines entered their protest against the miquity of the 
system ; among the latter, were Dr. Hayter, Bishop of 
Norwich, the celebrated Bishop Warburton, and Dr. 
Samuel Johnson. But though the names of these 
friends of the oppressed might crowd the pages of a 
book, yet, when we consider the length of time and ex- 
tent of a country over which they spread, they seem in- 
deed, “like angels’ visits, few and far between.” . 
At length appeared Granville Sharp, the morning 
star of Negro freedom. ; 
The planters and merchants had for some time been 
accustomed to bring slaves with them to England: 
many of these ran away from their masters, and receiv- 
ed the protection of the inhabitants. Asa notion was at 
this time generally prevalent, that the Negroes, if bap- 
tized into the Christian faith, could not be claimed as 
slaves, many of them applied to clergymen for baptism ; 





LECTURE IV. 191 


and some responsible citizens of London became spon- 
sors on the occasion, who conceived themselves bound 
to defend the Negroes’ right to freedom in these cir- 
cumstances. This gave rise to frequent contentions ; 
till at length, in 1729, the Attorney and Solicitor Gene- 
ral gave it as their opinion that a slave was not made 
free by coming to England, even though he should be 
baptized. This, of course, gave boldness to the holders 
of slaves: the British newspapers were defiled with ad- 
vertisements for run-away slaves, with their marks ; 
and with notices of Negroes for sale. In the year 
1765, a poor Negro of the name of Strong, was so un- 
mercifully beaten and ill used by his master, that he was 
rendered unfit for service, andina helpless and crippled 
state was turned adrift. Applying to Mr. Sharp’s 
| brother, a medical gentleman of great humanity, Gran- 
ville Sharp became acquainted with him, and soon felt 
_a_lively interest in his fate. By the kind attentions of 
these gentlemen he was restored to health and comfort; 
and then the ruthless master, who, having reduced him 
to the most deplorable condition by his barbarity, had 
abandoned him, seized on him as his prey, to drag 
him on board a ship for the West Indies. Granville 

Sharp espoused his cause; a severe contest ensued, 
which terminated in the rescue of the poor Negro. 
But, still, all who were engaged in the administration 
of English law were strongly influenced by the high 
authority of the Attorney and Solicitor General, who 
had pronounced an opinion against the freedom of the 
slave: Mr. Sharp, therefore, with a disinterested phi- 
tanthropy, gave himself up for some years to the study 


ow 
q 


192 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


of the legal question, and in 1769 produced a work on. 
the subject, which was considered by some eminent pro- 
fessional men to be decisive. Several sharp struggles 
ensued, but the glowing zeal of his benevolence was” 
not to be damped by difficulties. At length, in the case 
of one Somerset, after it had been argued in the courts 
of Westminster for three sessions, in January, February, 
and May, 1772, the memorable decision was pronounced 
by the judges, that as soon as a slave sets his foot on the 
English soil he becomes free.* This was a glorious: 
triumph of humanity, after an arduous struggle of seven 
years, commenced and carried on principally by a com- 
paratively obscure individual ;—an instructive example 
of what may be achieved, in spite of the most formidable 
difficulties, by persevering and zealous efforts in a good 
cause: and the name of Granville Sharp is enrolled in 
the imperishable annals of humanity, surrounded by a- 
brighter halo of glory than ever surrounded the brows, 
of an Alexander or a Cesar. ; 
But though the genius of Britain thus drew a circle 
around our native land, into which the fiend of slavery 
dared not to enter, he was still permitted to riot in all 
his accustomed excesses, from the coasts of Africa to the 
West-India colonies. The second period, however, will 
bring us to the year 1807, in which his power received 


* Far otherwise is it, in New-England. Here a slave finds no 
refuge, no protection. If claimed by one, who has the audacity 
to call a man his property, he is taken by New-England sheriffs, 
and by a New-England magistrate is delivered into the hands of 
his oppressor. Not even the common privilege of a jury-trial is: 


granted to him.—Am. Ep, 


LECTURE IV. 193 


‘a considerable check. By the struggles and the deci- 
sion above mentioned, a deeper and more general inter- 
est was excited in the fate of the oppressed Africans, 
Many, of various ranks and parties and religious de- 
nominations, stood boldly forward to plead their cause; 
among whom may be mentioned the venerable Mr. 
Wesley, who, while he was laboring with unremitting 

_ zeal to free the minds of men from error and vice, would 
have broken the fetters of the slave, and fully recognised 
‘him as “a man and a brother.’ The first person who 
had the boldness and humanity to bring the subject be- 
fore the British Parliament, was Mr. David Hartley, 
member for Hull, (the son of the celebrated Dr. Hart- 

‘ley,) who in 1776 denounced the iniquity of the slave- 

trade in the House of Commons, and, having laid on 

the table some of the chains that were used, moved that 

“the slave-trade was contrary to the laws of God and 
the rights of men.” His motion was seconded by Sir 

| George Saville, member for Yorkshire. 

One circumstance, which soon after produced a con- 
siderable impression, was a suit brought against the un- 
-derwriters for a loss caused by the captain of a slave- 
ship throwing overboard one hundred and thirty-two 
‘Negroes alive! This barbarous wretch was not tried 
for the murder of these one hundred and thirty-two hu- 
man beings in cold blood; and were it not that his own- 
ers attempted to recover their value from the under- 
writers, who resisted the demand, this horrid transaction 
would have sunk into oblivion, and these poor wretches 
might have gone, without notice or pity, after the 

13 






194 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


thousands that have perished in the same manner, or in 
a way equally barbarous. 

From a very early period the society of Friends did 
themselves honor by espousing the cause of humanity, 
and in the most public manner protesting against slave- 
ry and the slave-trade, both in England and in America. 
By them was the first association formed in favor of the 
slaves; and by them was the first petition presented to 
Parliament on this subject, in 1783. The first town 
which sent up a petition against slavery was Bridge- 
water, in 1784. 

In the year last mentioned, Dr. Peckard, in a sermon 
preached before the University of Cambridge, warmly — 
advocated the Negroes’ cause; and, when he was Vice- 
chancellor of that university, he gave, in 1785, as a 
prize essay, the subject, “ Anne liceat invitos in servitu- 
tem dare?” “Is it right to make slaves of others 
against their will?” Mr. Thomas Clarkson, who had 
already obtained literary honors, engaged, with youth- 
ful ambition, in a contest for this prize; but while he 
was collecting facts and circumstances to support his” 
thesis, his mind was so powerfully impressed as to allow 
him no rest, till at length, with an elevated and gene- 
rous devotion, he resolved on giving up his time, his 
talents, his whole soul and body, to the cause of Negro 
freedom. He was soon brought into contact with many 
others whose minds were strongly excited on this sub- 
ject, and, among the rest, was introduced to Mr. Wil- 
berforce, a name dear to humanity, who pledged himself 
to bring the matter forward in the House of Commons. 


“ LECTURE IV. 195 


On the 22d of May, 1787, a society was formed for the 
abolition of the slave trade. 

From this period the labors of the Committee were 
great, and the exertions of those who sought the abolition 
of this horrid traffic, were incessant. Mr. Clarkson 
travelled many thousands of miles to collect information 
and procure evidence; many appeals were made to the 
public and to the government by the press; a deep in- 
terest was excited; and an active and determined spirit 
of opposition was manifested. On the 9th of May, 
1788, Mr. Pitt, on account of the illness of Mr. Wilber- 
force, brought the subject before Parliament: this was, 
however, only to obtain a pledge to take it into early 
consideration during the next session. Accordingly, in 
1789 Mr. Wilberforce made his first motion relative to 
the slave trade, which met with great opposition, and 
which was followed by very warm discussions in the 
House. 

The contest now became most animated, both in and 
out of Parliament. On the one hand were the planters, 
the great slave proprietors resident in England, the 
West-India merchants, the African merchants, the slave 
captains, and all who gained their living by this barba- 
rous trade, and thought that their ‘“ craft was in danger.” 
By these the most strenuous efforts were made to defeat 
the measures of the abolitionists, and to retain their posi- 
tion. Those who opposed the slave trade were de- 
nounced as rash innovators, as mad enthusiasts: wit- 
nesses were found who deposed before the House of 
Commons, not only as to the necessity, but the actual 
percy eid charity of the slave trade: the middle passage 


196 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


was declared to be the happiest time of a Negro’s life, 
and his situation in the plantations as really enviable. 
The most fearful outcries were made of the danger of 
parliamentary interference, and alarming representations 
were industriously circulated, of the certainty of the ins 
surrection of the Negroes and the massacre of all the 
White men, the ruin of the colonies, and the irreparable 
injury which would be sustained by our commerce and 
our navy. The injustice, further, of interfering “ with 
vested rights,” and destroying the property of thousands 
to please the wild benevolence of fanatics, was loudly 
denounced; and, to intimidate the nation, compensation 
was demanded to an amount so enormous, as it was 
known could not be given: in a word, all the means of 
a numerous and wealthy body of men were put in Te 
quisition to prevent the cessation of the most horribly 
cruel, and iniquitous trade, in which men had ever en- 
gaged. 

On the other hand, all the friends of humanity, of 
freedom, and of religion, were on the alert, and rallied 
round the standard which the committee in London had 
reared; Churchmen, and Dissenters of every name; all 
ranks, from the prince to the cottager, united their ef 
forts. Witnesses were brought from various parts of 
the kingdom, who had been residents in Africa or the 
West-Indies; the press was kept constantly at work, 
and information was circulated through the country in 
every form: in short, every means that the ingenuity 
of benevolence could suggest, was zealously employed 
to hasten the extinction of this inhuman traffic. 

But we cannot, consistently with our plan, enter into 


LECTURE IV. 197 


all the particulars of this arduous struggle, or attempt 
to describe the incessant exertions, the unwearied toils, 
the deep anxieties, the hopes and fears, the successes 
and defeats, the encouragements and despondency which, 
as the tide of battle fluctuated, attended this great con- 
test. Sometimes, when the measure seemed on the 
point of being carried, it was defeated by the dexterous 
manceuvering of the opponents; when it had with the 
greatest difficulty passed the Commons, it was rejected 
by the Lords. New enemies started forward in the 
ranks of opposition, and new friends as unexpectedly 
arose: now the excitement of public feeling, expended 
in fruitless efforts, seemed relapsing into apathy ; and 
now it was animated with redoubled zeal: one while 
the friends of the injured African were ready to retire 
in despair, and nothing appeared to be left to them but 
‘to weep over sufferings and wrongs which they could 
not redress; and again they rallied their forces, girded 
on their armor, and rushed to the breach; till’at length, 
after a contest of twenty years, victory declared on the 
side of humanity.* In 1807 a bill was brought into 
the House of Lords for the abolition of the slave trade, 
by Lord Grenville, then at the head of the administra- 
tion; which, having passed, was introduced into the 
Commons by Lord Howick, now Earl Grey: on the 
25th of March it received the royal signature. By this 
it was enacted that no slave should be imported into our 
colonies after March 1, 1808.t 





* For a particular account of this memorable struggle, see 
_Clarkson’s “ History of the Abolition of the Slave Trade,” 2 vols. 
- Bvo. 


+ The United States abolished the slave trade about the same 


198 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


The next great movement in favor of Negro freedom 
was in 1823. This third period of our historical sketch 
embraces sixteen years. By the important Act which 
abolished the slave trade, the cruelties perpetrated in 
Africa, with all the horrors of the passage to the colo- 
nies, ceased, so far asthe British were concerned. ‘This 
was indeed considered as a glorious achievement of be- 
nevolence. But still no reparation was made to those 
who had been the victims of acknowledged cruelty and 
injustice: they were left to suffer all the wrongs and 
miseries which had been inflicted on them under the 
sanction of the British nation. The law made no pro- 
vision for those who were actually suffering; it was 
only a preventive measure. The Negroes were recog- 
nised as stolen property, as a people “ robbed and spoil- 
ed,” but not the least effort was made towards restitu- 
tion: this seemed such a sketch of justice, as even the 
friends of the Ngroes dared not ask, and were almost 
afraid to name. Great as was the triumph gained over 
brutal cruelty and sordid avarice and injustice, it is hu 
miliating to human nature to reflect, that the furthest 
point to which the tardy justice of a Christian nation 
could go, was to refrain from the most impious and 
systematic barbarities which the world ever witnessed, 
without advancing a single step towards a reparation of 


time. The African slave trade was abolished by law, but not in 
fact. ‘Thousands are every year torn from that blighted conti- 
nent, and brought into this country: some of them directly to 
New Orleans, or the ports on the Gulf of Mexico, but most of 
them by the way of Cuba.—The American slave trade has been 
increasing yearly, in amount and in cruelty—Am. Ep. 


LECTURE IV. 199 


the wrongs they had committed. The act of plunder 
was denominated infamous, but the prey was retained! 
It was soon after declared by the legislature felonious, 
and at length piratical, to make the Negroes slaves; but 
to keep those in slavery who had suffered the wrong 
was permitted as a thing lawful and right. 

The principal occurrence of the period now under 
consideration was, that at the Congress of Vienna, in 
1815, the representatives of all the great powers of Eu- 
rope declared the slave trade to be inhuman, immoral, 
and unjust, and pledged themselves to effect its univer- 
sal abolition. It is deeply to be regretted that this 
pledge has not been redeemed: up to this period, though 
Spain and Portugal and France have declared slave- 
trading to be illegal, they still dishonor themselves by 
conniving at the continuance of this odious traffic. 
France, in 1814, had pledged herself to the termimation 
of this trade in five years: upon the return of Napole- 
on from Elba, he at once pronounced it abolished: on 
the restoration of Louis XVIII. a similar decree was 
passed; yet to this hour no effective measures have 
been adopted to secure its operation; itis still, and that 

‘with the knowledge of the French government, carried 
on by that nation to a great extent.* 

During the twenty years’ struggle for the abolition 
of the slave trade, the monstrous evils of the slave sys- 
tem as it existed in the West Indies, were brought un- 


* 'This was written before the recent revolution which has pro- 
duced the expulsion of the Bourbons from France. The pros- 
pects opened by this event, in respect to slavery and the slave 
trade, are consoling to humanity. 


200 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


der notice; and one great reason why the friends of 
the Negroes did not at once direct their attention to the 
entire and immediate abolition of slavery, as well as of 
the slave trade, was, that they believed, that, when a 
further importation of Negroes was impracticable, such 
would be the improvement in the treatment of those al- 
ready domesticated in the colonies, that their condition 
would be greatly ameliorated, and a certain, though 
gradual, extinction of slavery itself would follow. In 
this, however, the abolitionists subsequently found that 
they were greatly mistaken. Year after year passed 
away without any material improvement in the state of 
slavery, or any satisfactory ground to hope for the final 
extinction of that oppressive system; and at length the 
conviction was forced upon them, that nothing but Par- 
liamentary interference could afford any hope of essential 
benefit to the slaves, or hold out any prospect of the 
termination of their wretched bondage. In order to 
accomplish this object, a Society was formed, under the 
patronage and presidency of his Royal Highness the 
Duke of Gloucester, comprising, among others, various 
members of both Houses of Parliament, and all the sur-. 
viving leaders in the last great contest. A full exposi- 
tion of the actual state of slavery at that time in the Brit- 
ish colonies having been laid before the public in vari- 
ous works,* the almost immediate result was the presen- 
tation of numerous petitions to Parliament, which, had 


* Among many others, may be mentioned pamphlets by Mr. 
Wilberforce, Mr. Clarkson, and Mr. Macaulay, followed by Mr. 
Stephen’s more elaborate work, entitled “ Delineation of Negro 
Slavery.” 


LECTURE Iv. 201 


time permitted, would have been greatly multiplied. 
On the 15th of May, 1823, Mr. Buxton brought for- 
ward in the House of Commons the following resolu- 
tion, “ That the state of slavery is repugnant to the prin- 
ciples of the British Constitution and of the Christian 
Religion; and that it ought to be gradually abolished 
throughout the British dominions, with as much expe- 
dition as may be consistent with a due regard to the 
_ well-being of the parties concerned.” 
_ Mr. Buxton, in the course of his speech, signified, that 
if his motion were adopted, it was his intention to fol- 
_ low it up with certain measures, which he then gene- 
rally stated. The object of them was, First, to amelio- 
rate the present condition of the slaves; and with this 
, view to consider them no longer as chattels in the eye 
of the law; to render their testimony admissible in 
courts of law; to confer upon them rights of property ; 
to give the presumption of freedom to the Negro, and 
to place the burden of proof on those who claim him as 
_aslave; to remove existing obstructions to manumis- 
_ sion ; to abolish the inter-colonial slave-trade ; to restrain 
iene punishments, and to abolish the mt Sys- 
tem; to give a legal sanction to the marriage of slaves; 
to cbse for them effectual religious instruction ; és 
give them Sunday exclusively for repose and ciel 
fa and to allow them other sufficient time to cultivate their 
: provision grounds and attend the market; and to pre- 
| vent any slave-owner from being ‘paged a governor, 
judge, or attorney-general in any slave colony. Sec- 
ondly, to make provision for the emancipation of the 
present race of slaves, (a provision which, it must be 


202 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


confessed, fell far below the claims of those injured peo- 
ple on the justice, to say nothing of the humanity, of 
the British nation,) by enabling the slave to purchase 
his freedom, by the payment at once ofa fair price for 
his redemption, or a fifth part of that price for a time, 
in return for an additional day in the week to be em- 
ployed for his own benefit, till he might be enabled to 


purchase the whole. Thirdly, to prevent the slavery 


of their future race, by fixing a day after which all 
their children should be born free. 

Mr. Canning, on the part of his Majesty’s govern- 
ment, proposed as a substitute for Mr. Buxton’s motion, 
the Resolutions which have been already specified,* 
which were, after much discussion, passed without any 
division; Mr. Canning having intimated his willing. 


ness to adopt almost all the ameliorations in the present 


condition of the slaves, which had been suggested by 
Mr. Buxton. The resolutions, however, were not pass 
ed without a strong protest, on the part of Mr. Buxton 


and his friends, against confiding, as Mr. Canning 


stated to be his intention, the work of amelioration to 
the colonial authorities—Thus passed these famous 
Resolutions, with the express concurrence of the West 


Indians then in Parliament, but with distinct expres: 


sions of distrust of their efficacy by the abolitionists, 
whom experience had convinced that the plan proposed 
by Mr. Canning, of referring the work of reform to the 
colonial assemblies, would lead to no beneficial results. 
But, however deficient those Resolutions might have 





* Page 46. 


LECTURE lV. 203 


proved, in doing justice to an injured people, and in 
making reparation for their cruel wrongs, there were 
certain important points gained by them, which must 
not be overlooked. If the strong-hold of slavery was 
not carried, some positions were obtained in advance, of 
great importance to future operations. It was admitted, 
by the unanimous voice of Parliament, that the slaves 
were his Majesty’s subjects, and that their condition re- 
quired the interference of the British Parliament. Par- 
liament also, by its resolutions, pledged itself to the final 
abolition of slavery. 

‘The fourth period of our historical sketch brings us 
down to the present time, and includes the seven years 
which have elapsed since the resolutions of 1823 were 
adopted. 

As no doubt was at that time entertained of the sin- 
cerity of his Majesty’s ministers, a strong and general 
hope was excited that the severities of the slave system 
would be at once greatly mitigated; and that at some 
future, and not distant, period freedom would be con- 
ferred on the slaves. The carrying of these Resolu- 
tions into effect was, therefore, at the request of the min- 
isters of the Crown, left to them. They were, however, 
warned, by those who well knew the inveteracy of colo- 
nial despotism, against trusting to the legislation of 
slave-owners for any effectual relief on behalf of those 
whom they held in bondage; but, to obviate the fears 
of those who sighed over the prospect of the delay, 
which was to be apprehended in relieving the miseries 
of their enslaved fellow-creatures, it was intimated in 
Parliament, by Mr. Canning himself, in terms suffi- 


204 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. i. 


ciently plain and strong, that, should the colonies refuse - 
to adopt the measures of reform which would be urged 
upon them, proper steps should be taken to compel them — 
to do so.—The wishes of Government on the subject 
were speedily forwarded to the colonial authorities ; and 
they were called upon, in the most distinct and urgent 
manner, to introduce forthwith into their slave codes 
such enactments as should secure the proposed reforms. 
But, instead of receiving with becoming respect the 
mild and conciliatory overtures of the British Govern- 
ment, the colonies with one voice, as had been antici- 
pated by the abolitionists, rejected the propositions in 
the most peremptory manner, and that in a way, in 
many instances, highly insulting to the mother country. 
The speeches delivered on the occasion, in some of their 
legislative assemblies, were of the most violent descrip- 
tion ; and the colonial journals indulged in outrageous 
abuse, not only of those whom they considered as “ ab- 
olitionists,” to whom every term of contempt was ap- 
plied which their rage and malignity could suggest, but 
also of his Majesty’s ministers themselves. In Deme- 
rara a disturbance arose among the slaves, who, though 
they committed no serious act of violence, and only, as 
far as it appears, suspended their labor in order to “in- 
quire and ascertain from the Governor what was the 
relief to which they supposed they were entitled by the 
instructions of the Crown, yet were declared to be in a 
state of rebellion, and, while endeavoring to negotiate 
with the military officers, were fired upon: many. were 
slain; many more were taken or dispersed; and the 
rest soon submitted to the means employed to quell 


LECTURE IV. 205 


them. Some ofthem were hung, and others condemned 
to receive a thousand lashes, and to work in chains for 
life; and, to complete the catastrophe, a holy and devot- 
ed missionary, by a trial which was a mockery of jus- 
tice, was sentenced toa traitor’s death. Plots also were 
pretended to be discovered in Jamaica, among the slaves, 
for rising on the White men, and, by a proceeding so 
shameless that even the West-India proprietors in Par- 
liament concurred in reprobating it, were many unfor- 
tunate Negroes condemned and hung. 

In the midst of the opposition and clamor of the colo- 
nies, an Order in Council was framed, in March, 1824, 
for the island of Trinidad, embodying many of the pro- 
posed measures of reform, but wholly omitting some 
that were most material, and in others falling short of 
the plans originally contemplated, and even promised, 
by Government. But even in Trinidad, a colony 
wholly dependent on the Crown, the colonists refused 
their concurrence, until a peremptory mandate from the 
Sovereign leaving them no alternative, obliged them to 
submit implicitly to the regulations laid down in the 
Order of Council. The other Crown colonies were re- 
quired to conform to it; but their compliance was so 
hesitating and imperfect, that years were wasted m friv- 
olous discussions and injurious concessions.—To the 
colonies having legislatures of their own, this Order 
was held out as a model for their imitation, and was 
strenuously urged on their adoption; but the recom- 
mendation was met either by an absolute refusal, or by 
a partial, evasive, and ineffective compliance. Thus the 
work of reform proceeded with all possible slowness. 


206 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


In the Houses of Assembly the ordinary language was 
that of bluster and defiance; even threats of asserting — 
their independence were frequently thrown out; and as 
for those modifications of their slave code, which they 
condescended most reluctantly to introduce, though 
lauded, by the colonists abroad and by West-India pro- 
prietors at home, as monuments of benevolence, they 
bear so many evident traces of injustice, oppression, and 
cruelty, as clearly to establish the fact of the utter in- 
competency of slave-owners to legislate for the extinc- 
tion of slavery. 

In 1824, Mr. Brougham brought forward the case of | 
the missionary Smith, and held up the conduct of the 
authorities of Demerara in this nefarious transaction, to 
the just execration of mankind. Mr. Denman subse- 
quently exposed to the British Parliament the shameful 
administration of justice in Jamaica, by which many un- 
fortunate Negroes were condemned to suffer death; and 
Dr. Lushington, Mr. Buxton, and others, also exposed, 
with great ability and effect, at different times, various 
acts of colonial oppression. Information on the state of 
things in the colonies, derived principally from docu- 
ments Jaid before Parliament, continued to be circulated 
among the public; and in 1826 the people again raised 
their voice, and by very numerous petitions remonstrat- 
ed with Parliament on the total inefficiency of all the 
measures hitherto adopted. Nothing effective, howev- 
er, has as yetbeen done. A few (so called) meliorating 
provisions have been adopted by some of the chartered 
colonies; but they are, in general, of little or no value, 
either from the want of the subsidiary or corresponding 


LECTURE IV. 207 


provisions requisite to give them effect, or from the ab- 
sence of all adequate sanctions to ensure their execution. 
For the regulation of the Crown colonies, an order in 
council, consolidating all former orders into one, was 
issued in February of the present year,* and exhibits a 
sketch of the measures of reform which Government is 
prepared to enforce on the Crown colonies, and to re- 
commend, but only to recommend, to the legislative 
adoption of the rest. 

‘The amount of all that has yet been done, in conse- 
quence of the Resolutions of 1823, may be thus stated: 
—In those colonies where the Crown has undeniable 
and full power to legislate, and to do all for the en- 
slaved population which justice and humanity dictate, 
only the following reforms are to be introduced: No 
slave-owner can fill the office of protector, though he 
may that of assistant-protector: Sunday markets are 
abolished, but no time is given in lieu of Sunday, either 
for markets or provision grounds: the use of the driv- 
ing whip in the field is prohibited: the flogging of fe- 
males is discontinued: arbitrary punishment by the 
master or his delegate is restricted to twenty-five lashes : 
punishments on plantations are to be recorded: the 
marriage of slaves is legalized, with a saving clause re- 
specting the owner’s rights to the slave’s wife and 
children: slave property is protected: families are not 
to be separated by sale: the enslaved Negro hasa right 
to purchase his freedom whenever he has the power, 
but under some unnecessary and absurd restrictions: 


* Just about the time these Lectures were first delivered. 


208 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. — 


slave testimony is admitted: slaves are not to be pun- 
ished for complaining, unless a magistrate considers 
their motive culpable-—Such is the whole that Govern- 
ment, even where their power of legislation is uncon- 
trolled, seem disposed to do for the oppressed and in- 
jured slave. And even with respect to the reforms 
actually adopted, they leave the great mass of evil still 
remaining; while it is to be feared, that, as the admin- 
istration of the ameliorating laws is still to a great ex- 
tent in the hands of the slave owners, their full benefit 
will not be secured. And although the officer who is 
appointed the chief Protector must not himself possess 
slaves, yet, as he constantly resides among slave own- 
ers, and lives on terms of hospitality with them, I have 
not, I confess, such faith in human nature, as to believe 
that he will not imbibe such a portion of their prejudices, 
as will operate to the serious disadvantage of the unhap- ~ 
py Negroes. | 

In the Chartered Colonies very much less has been 
done than in the Crown Colonies. Two of them have 
abolished Sunday markets, but without securing othe 
time for marketing and labor. In two or three of the 
colonies, the driving whip, in the field or for punish- 
ment, has been replaced by the cat; and females, when 
flogged, are to be flogged decently. The power of arbi- 
trary punishments still generally extends to thirty-nine 
lashes at one time, but in a few small colonies is limited 
to twenty-five. Slave marriages are authorized, but en- 
cumbered with many most unreasonable impediments. 
Slave property is still without any efficient protection. 
The regulations introduced to prevent the separation of 


LECTURE IV. 209 


families by sale, are wholly inadequate to their end. 
Slave testimony is admitted only in two colonies: inthe 
others it is so fettered with conditions as to render it of 
no benefit to the slave. In one colony the presumption 
of the law is in favor of freedom.* Such, then, after 
seven years of expostulation and remonstrance on the 
part of the British government, of anxious expectation 
on the part of the people, and of refusal and evasion on 
the part of the colonies, is the result of all that has been 
done for the suppression of this murderous system, or 
for the relief of those whom it unjustly holds in bond- 
age! Allthe worst features, therefore, of this degrading 
slavery still remain, to criminate all who engage in it, 
and all who tolerate and sanction it. Compulsory and 
severe labor, uncompensated toil, a constant liability to 
dreadful lacerations at the will of the owner or manager, 
and the probability of a severe flogging for even attempt- 
ing to seek redress, are common to all these colonies. 
In most of them, families may still be sold in different 
lots, and separated forever; females may be flogged in 
a cruel and indecent manner; grievous obstacles are 
thrown in the way of slave marriages; a slave has no 
right to purchase his freedom, even if he should have 
the means; his evidence against a white or free man is 
not received; and his property is destitute of all legal 








* We beg those of our readers, who are wont to advise that 
Slavery should be abolished in our country gradually, and that 
the slave-holders should be left to abolish it in their own time, 
and in their own way—we beg them to peruse the three or four 
preceding and following pages with especial attention—Am. Ep. 


14 


210 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


security. In not one of the colonies is effectual legal 
provision made for the education or religious instruction 
of the slaves or their children; no day is given to them 
instead of Sunday, to labor for themselves, so as to se- 
cure an opportunity for rest and holy worship on that 
day. ‘They are, in fact, still degraded from the rank of 
human beings; possessed as chattels ; claimed as “ prop- 
erty in fee;”” worked, and whipped, and sold, privately 
or by auction, at the master’s pleasure; and they con- 
stitute an article of traffic, as much as cattle.* In short, 
all the boasted ameliorations of colonial law leave the 
poor slave suffering the bitterest wrongs from his op- 
pressors, deprived of man’s dearest rights, ignorant, and 
brutalized, with no motive to exertion but fear, and with 
no hope of seeing better days but from the determined 
and persevering exertions of British benevolence. 

Let us now take a practical view of the question, and 
inquire what is the duty of the friends of religion and’ 
humanity respecting their enslaved fellow-creatures and 
fellow-subjects. 

We should, in the first place, cherish a lively sympa- 
thy for them. It is sufficient to entitle them to this, 
that they are suffering human beings. That man is 
certainly not to be envied who can hear unmoved of the 
distress of a fellow-creature, of whatever clime or color 





* For a particular statement of the reforms actually and pro- 
fessedly made in our slave colonies, see Anti-Slavery Reporter, 
Nos. 11, 21, 28,—34, 38, 52, 58; also the Examination of an Ab- 
stract of the British West-Indian Statutes for the Protection and 
Government of Slaves, published by the West-India Body, in the 
Anti-Slavery Reporter, No. 61, and No. 65, p. 369. 


LECTURE IV. Q11 


he may be. Can he make any pretensions to Christi- 
anity who is destitute of its benevolence and tenderness ? 
Let the sentiment of a heathen rebuke him: “Iam a 
man: whatever pertains toa human being interests me.” 
He scarcely deserves the name of man, who cannot give 
his sympathy to distress, or drop a tear over suffering 
humanity. But those for whom we are now pleading 
have additional claims,—they are our fellow-subjects. 
We live under a government which secures owr free- 
dom, but rivets the chains of slavery on them; which 
takes away from them the very blessings which it is the 
chief end of government to secure to all. While that 
government carefully protects owr persons and owr prop- 
erty, it gives to another the Negro’s labor, the Negro’s 
wife and children, the property in his own body and 
limbs ; and by legal enactments authorizes the wanton 
or capricious laceration of his flesh, and recognises him 
_asa saleable article * But not only are they fellow- 
creatures and fellow-subjects, but they owe all the mise- 
ries under which they groan, all the wrongs which they 
suffer, to the British nation. By whom were they first 
deprived of liberty? By British slave-dealers, or their 
agents. And how were they transported from their na- 
tive Africa to our colonies? In British ships, by Brit- 
ish sailors. By whom are they now bought and sold 
_ and worked and flogged? By British slave-owners, or 
their deputies. By whom is a considerable portion of 
_ those wretched beings possessed? By British nobles, 
and senators, and merchants; by men much of whose 





* See the Consolidated Act for the Crown colonies. 





212 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


wealth has been extracted from the unpaid toil of Ne: 
gro slaves. There is, then, no class of sufferers in the 
British dominions who have stronger claims on our 
sympathy. 

There are some who affect to ridicule the sensibility 
of those who mourn over the Negro’s wrongs. I pity 
such, whether the fault is in their understanding or 
their heart. Are the charities of our nature to be 
guided by the color of the skin? Does not a human 
heart beat in his bosom, and human blood flow in his 
veins? Has he not the affections and antipathies, the 
joys and sorrows, the hopes and fears, which are com- 
mon to humanity? Is he nota man, possessing ration- 
al faculties, and an immortal soul capable of being pre- 
pared for all the blessedness of heaven ? 

But the enslaved Negroes are sometimes represented 
as degraded to a point below our sympathy. And how 
are they so degraded, but by that debasing system which 
prevents the introduction of knowledge to the under- 
standing, which obstructs the exercise of every virtuous 
affection, and which inflicts on their minds injuries 
more serious and deplorable than even those which their 
bodies suffer? On this account, therefore, they are en- 
titled to the greater commiseration. 

Let it not be stated, as a plea for apathy, that the story 
of the Negro’s sufferings has been oft repeated, and is 
now grown stale. Is it not the continuance of their 
wrongs, still unredressed, that occasions this repetition? 
And is this to diminish our sympathy? Are our feel- 
ings of commiseration to be in an inverse ratio to their 
sufferings? How unchristian, how despicable, is that 


LECTURE Iv, 213 


selfishness, which turns away from the consideration 
ofthe miseries of others—like the Priest and the Levite, 
who, to spare themselves the pain of feeling for the 
wounded Samaritan and the trouble of helping him, 
“passed by on the other side.’ God has given the 
power of sympathy to man, that every sufferer might 
have an advocate in the heart of his fellow-creature ; 
and he who attempts to repress his sympathies, or who 
does not allow them their proper play, sins against the 
law of his nature, and endeavors to frustrate the kind 
intentions of his Creator. We must not allow our 
charity to be exhausted while a sufferer remains. By 


cherishing a lively commiseration in our own minds, oth- 


) 


ers will catch the emotion, and that general and power- 
ful fellow-feeling will be produced, in which alone, un- 
der God, the help of the Negro is placed. 

There is one thing, however, which has a considera- 
ble tendency to prevent that strong and general senti- 
ment of compassion for the enslaved population of our 
colonies which their unhappy condition claims: it is 


_ the distance to which the place of their bondage and of 


their suffermgs is removed from us. Slavery would 
not have been endured so long, had the scene of its 


1 


mischiefs been nearer.to England. 'That which is near 
generally affects us more sensibly than that which is 
remote ; and in proportion to the distance of any scene 


_ ofaction or of suffering, we seem to lose the impression 
of its reality. But this is an illusion. There lie the 


J 
a 


West-India islands on the bosom of the ocean, in all 
their beauty; and the same sun which shines on us 
lights them up with a still more glorious splendor: 


214 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


while there, as truly, do all the unspeakable miseries of 
slavery spread their gloomy shadows over the thousands 
of our race who inhabit them. What though the 
depths of the Atlantic roll between us and the planta- 
tions, and their gangs, and their drivers, and all their 
degrading apparatus of brutal coercion ; are these colo- 
nial scenes, therefore merely ideal? Endeavor to dis- 
pel the illusion, and to give to them their living reality. 
While you are enjoying the blessings of freedom, think 
of those who are toiling in bondage. While the holy 
pleasures and calm repose of the Christian Sabbath are 
delighting and refreshing your spirits, let your thoughts 
revert to those to whom it brings no rest; who are toiling 
on their plantation grounds for a scanty subsistence, or 
busily occupied in the Sunday market. While you 
behold your children with all the fondness of parental 
affection, and form your plans for their future welfare, 
oh think on those whose infants are born to the sad in- 
heritance of slavery; who belong not to their parents, 
but to their masters; whom neither a father’s love nor 
a mother’s fondness can rescue from the iron grasp of 
oppression. Think on their unrequited toil, their con- 
stant exposure to cruel punishments and brutal insults. 
Think of the deep degradation to which these human 
beings, heirs with ourselves of immortality, are reduced ; 
spoiled of all their rights, and suffering intolerable” 
wrongs. And, in realizing with compassion and ten- 
derness their unhappy condition, you will obey the in- 
junction of the Divine word, ‘‘ Remember them that are 
in bonds, as bound with them.” 

And if their claims to commiseration are thus just 


LECTURE IV. 215 


and strong, they certainly are entitled to something 
more—to those prompt and decisive efforts on their be- 
half which shall cause their sufferings to cease. And 
it is most certain, that if you, the British public, do not 
act, nothing effectual will be done to this end. To 
talk of trusting to the planters so to ameliorate the con- 
dition of the slaves as to prepare them for emancipation, 
is the wildest folly ; it is to suppose them to act contra- 
ry to all their prejudices and habits, and imagined in- 
terests; it is out of the course of nature. Can slave- 
owners be expected voluntarily to adopt regulations 
which shall diminish their own power, lessen the dis- 
tance between them and their slaves, and prepare the 
Negroes to be as free as themselves? What exercise 
laws should we have, if it were left to smugglers to 
frame them? And do not the proceedings of the colo- 
nial legislatures fully justify all that has been said of 
their incompetency ? What were the laws which ex- 
isted in these colonies before the investigations of Par- 
liament in 1788, but a libel on legislation and a disgrace 
to human nature? In some of them, while the enslav- 
ed Negro must not lifta hand in his defence against 
wanton cruelty, or even to save his own life, the most 
barbarous mutilations inflicted on a slave, nay, even his 
murder, was only punishable by small fines and impris- 
onment. Look even at the ameliorating acts, which 
have been passed since the iniquity of the system was 
brought to light, and the public voice raised against it, 
and they will show how little is to be expected from 
slave-holding legislators. And have even these worth- 
less reforms been voluntary? All the ameliorations, 


216 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


every degree of improvement in the legal condition of 
the slaves, have been wrung from them, like drops of 
blood, by the voice of the British people, the resolutions 
of Parliament, and the fear that, if something were not 
conceded, all would be lost. Allow me to repeat the 
appropriate language of an illustrious statesman, now 
no more, which, often as it has been quoted, will never 
cease to be repeated while slavery exists. ‘ Trust not 
the masters of slaves in what concerns legislation for 
slavery. However specious their laws may appear, 
depend upon it they must be ineffectual in their opera- 
tions. It is in the nature of things that they should be 
so... . Let, then, the British House of Commons do 
their part themselves. Let them not delegate the trust 
of doing it to those who cannot execute that trust fairly. 
Let the evil be remedied by an assembly of free-men by 
the government of a free people, and not the masters of 
slaves. Their laws can never reach, can never cure 


the evil.” * 
But let us not attempt to justify our inactivity by re- 


ferring the matter exclusively to Government, or leaving 
it with Parliament. What measure of popular liberty 
has the Government ever adopted uninfluenced by the 
people? What step has it ever taken on behalf of 
the slaves, till it has been called upon again and again 
by the voice of the public? If it is true that the people — 
can do nothing inthis business without Parliament, it is, 
perhaps, equally true, that Parliament will do nothing 





* Mr. Canning’s speech in 1799, on the Abolition of the Slave 
Trade. 


LECTURE Iv. 217 


in it without the people. What put an end to the slave 
trade? What produced the resolutions of 18232 What 
has effected the few reforms which have taken place? 
Not the spontaneous movements of the planters abroad, 
or of the legislature at home, but the strong feeling of 
the people of England. It istothe generous sympathy 
and energetic efforts of the British public, that 800,000 
unfortunate slaves are now looking as their only hope. 
But what is the object, the great and principal object, 
to which our efforts should be directed? Should it be 
amelioration, or abolition? To render their slavery 
less miserable, or to abolish slavery altogether? On 
this point, every principle of justice, every feeling of 
humanity, every dictate of religion, are all in unison, 
and say, ‘‘ Let this abomination cease: seek the extine- 
tion of slavery, and seek nothing less.” Every feeling 
heart must be gratified when the amount of human suf- 
fering is in any degree lessened; every pious and virtu- 
ous mind must rejoice at the diminution of the power 
and extent of vice: but to aim at the removal of buta 
part of these evils, would be a defective benevolence, a 
spurious piety. What should we think of that man’s 
morality, who should persuade a drunkard to get intox- 
icated not quite so often, or not quite so deeply; a high- 
wayman to rob with less violence; or a swindler, to 
cheat in smaller sums? Whatever may be the policy 
of the world, Christianity makes no compromise with 
vice, will admit of no partial abandonment of sin: it de- 
mands that it be removed at once, and forever, though it 
be as dear and as profitable as a “right eye” or “a 
right hand.” And is not this a Christian nation? And 


) 





218 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


is not slavery a sin? Is it not cruel oppression, foul in- 
justice, and flagrant crime? Shall we, then, seek mere- 
ly to mend it? Modify slavery as you will, as long as 
slavery exists it is an evil which ought not to be endur- 
ed. As long as one man is permitted to make his fel- 
low-creature an article of sale; to claim a property in 
him, his wife and children, and all their descendants; as 
long as he can buy, and possess, and work as cattle, a 
hundred or a thousand of human beings, as much the 
creatures of God, as much entitled to the blessings of 
redeeming mercy, as much the heirs of immortality, as 
himself; so long wickedness and injustice will continue 
the curse and condemnation of the system. The ques- 
tion is, comparatively, of small importance, how much 
or how little of bodily suffering it produces; it is an es- 
sential, an incurable evil: itis like the house under the 
Mosaic economy, in which the “fretting leprosy,” was 
found, the cleansing and repairing of which were vain; 
the pestilent infection of which endangered not only its 
inmates but the whole community ; which, therefore, 
whatever remonstrance was made, whatever loss might 
be sustained, was destined, not to gradual dilapidation, 
but to complete and speedy demolition. 

But if is objected, by the friends of slavery, that this 
would be an unjustifiable interference with ‘ vested 
rights,’ and with property legally possessed. And 
what are those rights? The right to do wrong with 
impunity ! the right of one man to take away the rights 
of another! Was ever language so preposterously mis- 
applied ?—And what is this property?’ The body and 
limbs of a man—the wives and children of other men! 





LECTURE IV. 219 


The very claim is impious. These boasted rights are 
flagrant wrongs; this property isthe forcible and fraud- 
ulent possession of what belongs toanother. God gave 
the Negro, life, and limbs, and faculties, to provide for 
himself and his offspring: what right have any to set 
up an adverse claim? What title could the African 
kidnapper or the European slave-captain give?—But 
“the statutes of Parliament have recognised this prop- 
erty.’ We have before proved that no human enact- 
ment can render that right which is in itself wrong; 
and that no law is of any validity which is contrary to 
the law of nature. If therefore, the British Parliament, 
unacquainted with the real state of the case, or influ- 
enced by interested men, has committed a mistake in 
legislation, is that any reason why it should persist in 
its error? If, by allowing one class of his Majesty’s 
subjects to enslave another class, the Parliament has 
done wrong, the sooner it retraces its steps the better. 
Ifit has, by erroneous legislation, recognised a property 
which cannot exist, and the exercise of a power which 
violates all justice, human and divine; is it to be pre- 
vented from a return to rectitude by the complaints of 
those who have taken advantage of its errors to oppress 
their fellow-men? The injustice consists in the enact- 
ment of such statutes, not in their repeal; the wrong 
lies in permitting its subjects to hold slaves, not in with- 
drawing that permission.* What deference should 


* We beg our readers to observe the ‘similarity of the objec- 
tions urged by the West-India party in England, to those which 
are thrown in the way of emancipation in this country —Am. Ep. 


220 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


we pay to laws framed by any of the Barbary states to 
perpetuate the bondage of those whom their piracies 
had enslaved? What sympathy should we have with 
the swarthy tyrants who should complain of their losses 
if the victims of their despotism were rescued from their 
grasp? With what emotion should we hear them 
talk of their “vested rights,” and of ‘ property recog- 
nised by law?” Do, then, the essential principles of 
justice vary with geographical position; or do virtue 
and vice depend on the color of a man’s skin? 

But if the Negroes are liberated, full compensation, 
it is said, must be given to the slave-owners. As this 
is a subject on which considerable difference of opinion 
exists, let me devote a few moments to a dispassionate 
consideration of it. Perhaps it will be found in this, as 
in most cases, that truth lies between the extremes. 
The amount of indemnification which some claim on 
behalf of the planter, as necessary to satisfy the claims 
of justice, is most enormous; is more, perhaps, than all 
the slave colonies are worth. The object in making 
these extravagant demands is, in all probability, to deter 
a people, already laboring under the pressure of an im- 
mense national debt, from prosecuting a work of beney- 
olence which would cost them so dear. This is no 
new expedient; its effect was tried when the abolition 
of the slave trade was in agitation. There are those, on 
the other hand who totally reject these claims on any 
ground. The principle on which compensation is 
claimed by the advocates of the colonists is, that when 
by a legal enactment any are deprived of their property, 
or aportion of it, provisionis always made for full indem- 


LECTURE IV. yy | 


nification: if a man’s house be taken down, or his gar- 
den be appropriated to the object of the enactment, com- 
pensation is provided as a matter of course.—But in all 
such cases there is this important difference; the prop- 
erty is of a kind which it is presumed has been lawful- 
ly acquired and possessed, and the enjoyment of which 
is no infraction to the rights of others. But this cannot 
be said of the assumed property in human beings. In 
property the possession of which implies any breach of 
morality, or which was acquired by unjust means, there 
is no recognition of the principle of indemnification. If 
a person by force or fraud becomes possessed of an es- 
tate, he is always liable to be called upon for restitu- 
tion: he has no title. Ifhe sell it or bequeath it, the 
transfer does not create a title: the purchaser buys it 
ata hazard. If it pass through a hundred hands, the 
original owner, or his legal representative, has still a 
claim ; and the law, when appealed to, compels restitu- 
tion, without any indemnification to him who has come 
into the possession of the property with a defective ti- 
tle.* Now the possession of slaves is a tenure of this . 


* The planters seem fully to understand and to act on this prin- 
ciple, however they might object to its application when it makes 
against them. In the newslave law of Barbadoes is an enact- 
ment to this effect:—S§ 25, 26. Any white, free person, or slave, 
buying of a slave stolen goods, knowing them to be stolen, shall 
be punished as the actual stealer would be. And if any stolen 
goods are found in the possession of any white or free person, or 
slave, although it cannot be proved that it was with the knowl- 
edge of their being stolen, yet such person, if a white or free per- 
son, shall be proceeded against as receivers of stolen goods are 
proceeded against in England, and shall be taken and deemed 
and punished as accessory to the felony after the fact. Now, 
substitute the term persons for goods, and how will the case stand 


997 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


kind; there can be no title; nothing can supply the 
original deficiency. Ifthe law at any time recognised 
it, it was a mistake, and in that case recantation is a 
virtue. The property in question is the Negro’s body: 
the rightful claimant still lives; and if the restitution is 
made which justice demands, the loss, in the natural 
course of things, falls on those who have speculated in 
this unholy traffic, or who inherit the fruits of their an- 
cestors’ misdoings; and it is thus that Providence some- 
times visits “the sins of the fathers upon the children 
to the third and fourth generation.” The Parliament 
of Britain has made the acknowledgment, in the face 
of the world, that the manner in which the Negroes were 
made slaves was felonious, and that, of course, those 
who were enslaved suffered unspeakable wrongs; but 
it stopped short, when it should have gone on. By the 
abolition of the slave trade it so far “ ceased to do evil,” 
but in omitting to make restitution it proved that it had 
not yet sufficiently “ learned to do well:” it prohibited 
the enslaving of any more Negroes, with the exception 
of the new-born infants of black British subjects, but it 
provided no reparation for those who had already been 
grievously wronged; they were left to suffer all the in- 
juries arising from a deprivation of their dearest rights. 


with reference to the Negroes? ‘Then the holders of slaves must 
be proceeded against as the receivers of stolen goods are in Eng- 
land—that is, in the first place, restitution is made of all the prop- 
erty which remains, without a thought about compensation; m 
the next place, condign punishment follows. We ask only for 
restitution of what remains of about two millions of Negro slaves 
stolen, and purchased knowing them to be stolen: as for the pun- 
ishment, we leave it to their consciences who have committed the 
wrong, and to a Higher Tribunal. 


LECTURE IV. Ca 


It is not, then, strictly on the ground of right or justice, 
that the planters can claim indemnification, since the 
releasing of their slaves is only a restitution of that 
which was wickedly acquired, and could never be law- 
fully possessed. But there is a party, which, on the 
very highest grounds, claims. compensation—it is the 
injured Negro. ‘The present generation have most of 
them a just claim to remuneration for years of hard and 
unrequited labor; and all of them are entitled to it for 
all the miseries of mind and body which their enslaved 
condition has entailed on them, and because they are 
the just representatives of all the wrongs which their 
fathers suffered, of the thousands and tens of thousands 
that perished on the African coast and inthe middle 
passage, and of the hundreds of thousands who ‘found a 
premature grave in the colonies, through excessive labor 


‘and cruel treatment.* 


But there is another view which may be taken of 
the case. ‘The planters do not stand alone in the guilt 
of the system. There are three parties,—the sufferer, 
the aggressor, and the abettor. The first thing to be 
considered is, in all justice, the reparation of the wrongs 


_ of the sufferer—compensation to the Negro. He should 


not only be liberated, but every possible care is owed to 
him, to instruct his mind, to elevate his character, and 
to put him in possession of the blessings of Christianity. 


* Yes, were we in this country to pay to the slave-holders the 
full price they put upon their slaves, if they would be strictly 
honest, they would have to pay over the whole, and more, to their 


slaves as ajust remuneration for their past unrequited toil.— 
Am. Ep. 


224 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


This is the onty atonement we can make to those who 
have suffered so much from British injustice.—In the © 
next place, here is a party by whom the wrongs have 
been inflicted and perpetuated. From them, every 
thing is required that can indemnify the Negro for his 
long bondage, and his unjust deprivation of almost all 
human rights. They may complain of the loss attend- 
ing restitution; so would the purchasers of stolen prop- 
erty; but boldly to claim such an indemnification, as 
though their dealings and doings had been most vir- 
tuous, and their property most justly acquired and pos- 
sessed, is intolerable-—There is, however, a third party, 
to which they may reasonably look; and that is, the 
British Parliament, which, by its sanction, became an 
abettor of the injustice, and a participator in the guilt; 
and, inasmuch as the nation also has encouraged and 
upheld the system by the purchase and consumption of 
slave produce, the people of England cannot be consid- 
ered as entirely free from being “ partakers of other 
men’s sins.” Let then these two parties, the slave- 
holders and the British nation, share the loss, in what 
proportions the Parliament may in its wisdom think 
fit; or, in other words, let such an indemnification be 
given to the planters as Parliament may deem to be 
just. And there is no national expense which could be 
incurred, which the people would bear more cheerfully | 
than that which might attend an act of justice and hu- 
manity, for which, with the exception of interested per- 
sons, the whole kingdom is sighing.* 





* Inregard to the question of compensation to the planters for 
the value of the slaves, in case the system of abolition should 


LECTURE IV. 225 


We have, we think satisfactorily, proved that it is the 
duty of British Christians to seek the abolition, and not 
merely the amelioration of slavery. Another important 





finally prevail, in the United States, there are a number of consid- 
erations to be taken into the account. There is first the argu- 
ment, that, morally and justly, no human being can be made the 
subject of property, and that all the laws which have been made, 
creating such property, are in themselves wrong and iniquitous, 
and ought never to have been made. And that the property in 
Slavery stands upon the same footing, with the property in a 
building used for a distillery and the machinery in the same, 
which property may be destroyed by the Legislature declaring 
the manufacture of ardent spirits unlawful and criminal. The 
loss of property in the latter case, is occasioned by capital being © 
invested in a business, which is immoral and injurious to the pub- 
lic welfare, and is the necessary effect of a law prohibiting the 
further prosecution of such a business. So would it be in the 
case of property existing in slaves, whenever the law shall de- 
clare slavery immoral and wrong, and make it no longer lawful. 

Again, it is said that there would be no actual loss sustained 
by the planters in case their slaves were emancipated. There 
are two considerations brought forward to show this. The first 
is, that the labor of the slave would be much more productive 
when he worked: on his own account, and under the stimulus of 
wages—and the second is, that the value of land would be very 
much increased both by the additional crops which could be ob- 
tained from free black labor, and from the facility of obtaining 
laborers by hiring them, instead of being obliged to make a 
great outlay of capital in their purchase. It would give an ad- 
vantage to persons of small capital, of which they are deprived 
_by the existing system of slavery. They could lay out all their 
money in land, instead of being obliged to lay out a large part 
of it in slaves. ‘This would bring much more land under cul- 
tivation, and the land being new and unworked, would be much 
‘More productive. A 


15 





226 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


inquiry now occurs: Should we aim at the gradual or 
the vmmediate emancipation of the enslaved Negroes ? 
There are advocates for each of these modes of accom- 


But should the question of compensation ever arise, and it 
should be deemed just and expedient to make such compensation 
to the planter, because the laws had created a property in slaves, 
and because he had acted agreeably to the laws in investing his 
capital in this kind of property, the inquiry would then be to 
what extent shall the compensation go,—to the whole value of the 
slave, ora part only. And it seems to me that it should be for a 
part only. I can see noreason nor justice, in giving a man three 
or four hundred thousand dollars as an indemnity for his slaves, 
because he has a sufficient number.to amount to this sum, accord- 
ing to his valuation. The value in-real estate on old roads, is 
often very much diminished by new roads, bridges and canals 
being made in new directions ; but the public do not feel them- 
selves bound to indemnify the sufferers. It is considered a suffi- 
cient plea, that the public welfare and necessities require it. And 
certainly the reason is as strong in regard to property in a human 
being, which was always wrong and unjust, as in regard to land 
which is a fair subject of property. 

The only claim, if any, it seems to me that can be made for 
compensation by the slave-holders, is, that it may occasion great 
distress, poverty, and embarrassment to individuals among them, 
if property in slaves is taken from them without any equiva- 
lent. This then being the only plausible ground for a claim, the 
compensation to be given ought to have reference to the character 
of such a claim,—and should be sufficient to provide against dis- 
tress, poverty and embarrassment befalling individuals as a con- 
sequence of emancipation, and not place in their hands an im- 
mense fortune in money in lieu of their slaves,—especially as ev- 
ery thing granted them from the national treasury would be so 
much taken from the property belonging in part to the industri- 
ous population of the non-slave-holding states, most of whom are 
persons of small property, and depending upon their daily labor 


LECTURE IV. 297, 


plishing the great object. The following is a brief 
summary of the arguments on either side. It must, 
however, be premised, that this is a question not between 


for their daily bread—It seems to me, therefore, that a certain 
proportion, as one half or one third of the value of the slave, is all 
that under any circumstances ought to be given,—or the amount 
of compensation on each slave might be in an zmverse ratio to the 
number of slaves owned by an individual. 

But the question of compensation has in fact nothing to do 
with the right of the slave to freedom, nor with the duty of the 
master to emancipate him. Suppose the people of this country 
were too poor, and could not be convinced that they ought to pay 
a dollar as the price of their liberty, would their inability or un- 
willingness to pay for it, annul or lessen at all the rights of the 
slaves to liberty? It has been said, “ that no compensation should 
be given to the planters emancipating their slaves, because it 
would be a surrender of the great fundamental principle, that man 
cannot hold property in man, because slavery is a crime, and is 
not therefore to be sold.” Whether this be correct or not, if the 
slave-holder should be convinced that slavery in itself wasa great 

wrong and a great sin, he would no more think of insisting upon 
“a compensation for ceasing to do such a great wrong, than an 
upright man who should hold any other kind of property, that 
| had been wrongfully taken from another, would hesitate to give 
it back to its real owner, although by so doing he should make 
himself poor. Aman with slaves in his possession, is like a man 
with counterfeit money in his possession, which he obtained by 
ignorance or mistake, and who is unable to ascertain from whom 
he received it, to get it exchanged for good money. The latter 
if an honest man, would not think of considering such counters 
feit money as his property, which he would be justified in using 
as such, and passing away to others in exchange for their property. 
It is his misfortune to hold such a kind of property, and he must 
make up his mind to suffera loss by it. Soit is with slaves, who 
are in fact but a counterfeit property, 












228 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


the friends of slavery and the advocates of Negro free: 
dom, but between those who are alike convinced of the 
essential and monstrous evils of the present system, and _ 
are desirous of effecting its complete extinction; who 
all agree that Negro slavery is a violation of man’s 
dearest rights, and contrary to the principles of Chris- 
tianity. But, while all admit the principle of the Ne- 
ero’s right to freedom, not at some distant time, but now, 
many of their ablest advocates have taken such a view 
of the difficulties of the case, as has led them to prefer 
some plan of gradual abolition, more or less speedy. 
Let us first notice the grounds on which they proceed, 
and then briefly advert to the plans which have been 
proposed. 

It is said, that as the arrangements which it will be 
necessary to enter into with the planters will involve 
considerable pecuniary sacrifices, by a gradual mode of 
proceeding the difficulty arising from this cause will be 
diminished. To this it is replied, that as the nation has 
already paid dearly for the share it has had in the guilt 





We would not, however, by these remarks be considered as ex- . 
cluding from our sympathy, or beneficence, the suffering slave- 
owners any more than the suffering slaves. We would hold our- 
selves in readiness to assist to the extent of our power, to render 
the transition from slavery to freedom as easy, and as little incon- 
venient as possible to both parties. Only let the slave-holders 
recognise the right of their colored brethren to be regarded and 
treated as men, and it would be our duty and for our interest, to 
contribute largely to the introduction among them of all the 
means. of physical, moral, and intellectual improvement.— 


Am. Eb. 


| 
| 





LECTURE IV. 229 


of slavery, in what it has cost to support the colonial 
monopoly, the compensation which the planters are en- 


‘titled to expect, on account of the sanction which the 


British Parliament has given to their practices, is con- 
siderably lessened; and further, that if in the continu- 
ance, of this system there is a violation of the great 
principles of morality, no consideration of expediency 
ean justify it, seeing that “ what is morally wrong cannot 
be politically right.” Shall the Negroes go on to per- 
ish in bondage till the present race die off, because we 
and the planters cannot settle the pecuniary question ? 
The Negroes’ claim to freedom stands first, and is para- 
mount to all the rest; and this therefore ought to be 
settled, whatever becomes of other claims. Is it not a 
compromise of principle, a sacrifice of justice to expedi- 
ency, to withhold a right because it is inconvenient to be 
just? In how many ways can we in our expenditure 
be profuse, even to prodigality? Is it only when an act 
of national justice is concerned that we are to be parsi- 
monious ? 

But it is said, that an attempt gradually to abolish 
slavery will be more likely to succeed, as it will pro- 
duce less irritation in the minds of the planters, and 
meet with less opposition. It is, however, to be feared 
that no measures, which tend obviously and ultimately 
to rescue the Negro from the grasp of the slave-owner, 
will ever be received with cordiality. The violent hos- 


tility of the colonists to the measures for ameliorating 
slavery proposed by the government, for the jast seven 
_ years, gives but little reason to hope for their concur- 
rence in abolishing it. As long as slavery is permitted 


230 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


to continue, so long will there be a determined opposi- 
tion to every advance in favor of freedom. The longer 
the struggle is protracted the more provoking will be 
the irritation. Slave-owners will never be conciliated, 
but by our abandoning the cause of the Negro alto- 
gether.* 

But fears have been expressed, that, if the Negroes 
were liberated in their present condition, they would be 
excited to commit the most serious acts of violence on 
their masters, and that “anarchy, confusion, warfare, 
and blood, would be the dreadful effects of the too hasty 
and mistaken boon.” But it is thought, on the other 
hand, that these are imaginary fears, for which, neither 
reason nor facts afford any foundation. Would the 
laws cease to have any power? Would the force which 
it is now necessary to maintain in these colonies, in 
order to defend slavery, be of no avail whenthe Negroes 
were free? Is it impracticable to make any regulations 
which should provide for all the possible evils that 
might be supposed to attend a transition from bondage 
to liberty? Is there not something unnatural in the 
supposition, that by bestowing on a body of men a most 
important blessing, we should fire them with rage and 
indignation? Is there not more danger to be appre- 
hended from the continuance of our cruel system? 
What is there wanting now, but opportunity and pow- 
er to induce the Negroes to burst asunder the chains of 


* “Tn claiming to be exempted from all foreign interference,” 
says Governor Mc Dffiue, “we can recognise no distinction be- 
tween ultimate and immediate emancipation.”—Am. Ep. 


LECTURE IV. 231 


their bondage, and to assert those rights which they all 
know are their due? If some Christophe, or Toussaint, 
or some black Bolivar, should arise among them, how 
dreadful might be the struggle, and how perilous the 
consequences! It was not long since a mere handful 
of Maroons put the whole island of Jamaica in jeopardy. 

A free black peasantry would constitute the strength 
of the colonies: the danger really arises from their be- 
ing held in bondage. But what are the facts on which 
the opinion in question is grounded? The Negroes 
have been rather characterized by patient suffering, than 
by furious atrocity. Would the fierce Indian of Amer- 
ica have endured like the suffering African? The poor 
Negroes have, indeed, been sometimes driven by cruel 
usage to rise on their masters; and can this surprise 
us? “Oppression makes a wise man mad:” no won- 
der that it should goad on the Negro to acts of insub- 
ordination. We only wonder that they have not risen 
en masse, and long before this driven every white man 
into the sea. But what facts are there to justify those 
fears, which are the pretext for keeping 800,000 of our 
fellow-creatures in a state of abject bondage? It is per- 
fectly irrelevant to cite instances of tumult and insur- 
rection and slaughter, when enslaved Negroes have 
been making a violent effort to burst their chains, and 
to obtain their rights: these instances have been more 
rare.than might have been expected. But where are 
the proofs of wanton ferocity, and delight in the de- 
struction of white men, which Negroes, freed by law, 
have exhibited? Are they to be found among the 25,- 
000 rescued Africans of Sierra Leone? Or among the 


232 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


hundred thousand free blacks and persons of color in 
our colonies? Or among the numerous slaves that 
were planted in Nova Scotia, after the first American 
war, and in Trinidad after the second war with Amer- 
ica? Or among the multitudes who, without any 
preparation, were lately enfranchised in Columbia and 
in Mexico 1—But we are referred to St. Domingo, and 
to the massacres which attended the revolution in that 
island. Mr. Clarkson,* however, has satisfactorily 
shown that the dreadful outrages and massacres which 
are brought forward to frighten the advocates of Negro 
freedom, ‘occurred in the days of slavery, before the 
proclamations of Santhonax and Polverel;” that “they 
were occasioned, too, not originally bythe slaves them- 
selves, but by quarrels between the white and colored 
planters, and between the royalists and the revolution- 
ists, who, for the purpose of wreaking their vengeance 
upon each other, called in the aid of the slaves. And 
as to the insurgent Negroes of the north, in particular, 
who filled that part of the colony in those years with 
terror and dismay, they were originally put in motion, 
according to Malenfant, by the royalists themselves, to 
strengthen their own cause, and to put down the parti- 
zans of the French Revolution.” In 1793, a proclama- 
tion was issued by Santhonax, which “ promised free- 
dom to all the blacks who were willing to range them- 
selves under the banner of the republic ;” and subse- 
quently his colleague, Polverel, extended the proclama- 


* Thoughts on the Necessity of Improving the Condition, &c., 
pp. 19, &c. 


LECTURE Iv. 939°" 


tion of Negro freedom to the whole island, not only 
without any fears as to the safety of the masters, but as 
being “necessary to the personal safety of the white 
planters.” In the following year the Conventional As- 
sembly of France passed a decree for the abolition of 
slavery throughout the whole of the French colonies ; 
and so far from its being attended with “warfare and 
blood,” a witness of these transactions has published to 
the world the fact, that the Negroes remained quiet, 
continued to labor on the same plantations, and, provid- 
ed no attempt was made to reduce them again to slavery, 
or to restore the cart-whip, manifested the utmost docili- 
ty and-most patient industry. And are we, in the face 
of all these facts, to be frightened into the timid conces- 
sion of protracted bondage for the present race, with the 
faint hope of freedom, thrown to an unknown distance 
in the future, to be enjoyed, perhaps, only by an Gitom 
generation ? * ¢ 

But it has been further stated, that the interests of the 
enslaved Negroes render a gradual emancipation de- 
sirable ; that,such is the debased condition to which 
slavery has reduced them, they are disqualified for the 
enjoyment of freedom. But, on the other hand, will a 
continuance in this state give them the requisite qualifi- 
cation? Was slavery ever known to “clothe” a man 


* Mr. Clarkson declared, “that he had not, after a diligent 
and candid investigation of the conduct of emancipated slaves, 
under a great variety of circumstances, comprising a body of 
more than 500,000, a considerable proportion of whom had been 
suddenly enfranchised,—found a single instance of revenge or 
abuse of liberty.”—Am. Ep, 


234 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


‘¢ with the virtuous restraints of social life ?””—But their 
present state may be improved. This may have been 
thought practicable when we were less acquainted with 
the system; but recent experience has proved how ut- 
terly abortive must be every attempt materially to im- 
prove that state, so long as their degrading bondage ~ 
shall continue. It is hopeless to expect that the plant- 
ers ever will, or can, be sincere in preparing their 
slaves for freedom. Is there not also something unnat- 
ural and cruel in an argument of this kind? It makes 
the very injuries they have suffered from their oppressors 
a reason why they should not be rescued from their 
grasp. If they had been less injured, they might have 
obtained their liberty; but they have suffered so much 
wrong that they must continue in slavery :—because 
their fellow-creatures have so deeply oppressed them, 
they must now. not be relieved. Is not this givmga 
‘ bonus for crime, and encouraging the slave-holders, if 
they wish to retain their slaves, to keep them as far 
from improvement as possible? There must be some- 
thing unsound in an argument which involves so much 
injustice, and so many contradictions. The greater the 
injuries which they have endured by being deprived of 
their rights, the stronger is the reason that all these in- 
juries should be speedily effaced, by a ful] restitution, 
with interest, of all they have been deprived of, if that 
were by any means possible. But in what does this 
disqualification for freedom consist? It must be a 
strong case indeed which would warrant us in keeping 
our fellow-creatures ina state, which even the advocates 
for gradual abolition admit is contrary to all justice, and 


LECTURE lV. 235 


repugnant to Christianity. They are not able, it is 
said, to value freedom! This is altogether a gratuitous 
assumption ; but if it were true, they should be taught 
its worth, not in keeping them in bondage, but by allow- 
ing them to taste its blessings. But why do some of 
them toil out their lives, in addition to the rigorous ex- 
actions of their task-masters, year after year, in order, 
by almost imperceptible degrees, to raise a sum, with 
the hope before them of being able at some distant time 
to purchase their freedom? Why are the work-houses 
never empty of run-away slaves? Why have those in- 
surrections been raised, which have exposed the wretch- 
ed Negroes to all the merciless cruelties of West-Indian 
retribution? Does all this arise from an indifference 
to freedom? And if they could not properly value it, 
is that a reason why we should deprive them of what 
God has given to man as his birthright ?—But, we are 
told, they woald not make a good use of their freedom! 
This isa presumption which is destitute of proof. Are 
the free Blacks in our colonies, or in any part of the 
world, less peaceable, less loyal, less moral, than the 
Whites among whom they live? There are only two 
ways in which there could be a fear of their abusing 
their liberty,—by injuring society, or by injuring them- 
selves. As to acts of general outrage, we have shown 
that both reason and facts prove that the alarm is un- 
founded ; .and as to any disorderly conduct which might 
be apprehended, surely such municipal regulations 
might be framed as would provide against it; and any 
difficulty or expense attending them, together with all 
the forbearance which the case might require, would be 


/ 


236 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


the least atonement which could be made to the Negroes 
for all the grievous wrongs which they have suffered. 
And what is the injury which the enfranchised Negro 
would be likely himself to receive by obtaining his free- 
dom? Would he be more licentious than he is en- 
couraged to be now? Would he be debarred from the 
means of education and religious instruction, when he 
has his Sabbaths to himself, and needs not fear to be 
flogged and chained for praying ?—But “ he would be 
idle, and through his improvidence might perish for 
want!’ But what is it which makes him now, after a 
week’s severe labor for his master, toil in his provision 
grounds on a Sunday? Necessity: he must work on 
that day, says Mr. Stewart, or starve. And would there 
not be a similar motive if he were free ?—In fine, it ap- 
pears that such reasoning proceeds on a false principle: 
it assumes that the Negro would be the same abject, 
hopeless, improvident being, when free, as he is now in 
his enslaved condition. We have already seen, by the 
testimony of the Consul at Mogadore, what effect slavery 
had even upon Europeans, in the total debasement and 
brutal stupidity which it produced; and in the interest- 
ing volumes of Dr. Walsh ample and most cheering ev- 
idence is afforded of the happy effect of freedom on the 
Negro character; leading him to the conclusion, “ that 
a European had no pretext but his own cupidity, for im- 
piously thrusting his fellow-man from that rank in the 
creation which the Almighty has assigned him, and de- 
grading him below the lot of the brutes that perish.” * 








* See “ Notes on the Brazils, by the Rev. Dr. Walsh,” vol. i. 


pp. 134—141. 


LECTURE IV. 237 


That intelligent traveller, Baron Humboldt, from wit- 
nessing Negro industry in South America, bears his 
testimony to the fact that “ the unhappy slaves are capa- 
ble of becoming peasants, farmers, and land-holders.”— 
The Negroes, it is said, are idle! But what have they 
now to work for? What motive have they to put forth 
every energy to get through their work ?—They are 
improvident! But what stimulus have they to econo- 
my? Would not the hope of receiving their earnings 
be a better stimulus than the cart-whip? When a man 
works under the influence of fear, his spirits are soon 
jaded; he has no life; his strength is soon exhausted. 
Let hope stimulate him, and he works cheerfully ; his 
spirits support him, and with a much less expenditure 
of strength he can perform the same labor. Do not the 
Negroes work every where, when they are free—in 
North and South America, in Sierra Leone, in Hayti, 
and in our own colonies? ‘The comparative state of 
pauperism among the free Blacks and Persons of Color, 
and the Whites, seems decisive on this point. Froma 
tabular view, constructed from the returns furnished by 
the colonial authorities, and laid before Parliament in 
1826, it appears that “in a free Black and Colored pop- 
ulation, amounting to about 88,060, only 227 have re- 
ceived even occasional relief as paupers, being one in 
each 387 individuals; while of about 63,400 Whites, 
1675 have received such relief, being one in 38.”’"* The 
experiment, also, of Mr. Steele, in Barbadoes, is equally 
decisive in proving, that, when there is a prospect of 





* Anti-Slavery Reporter, vol. ii. p. 17. 


238 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


remuneration, the Negroes will not only work cheer- 
fully, but in a manner much more advantageous to their 
employers than coerced labor can be.* 

Such are the arguments by whicha gradual emanci- 
pation is supported, and such the objections which are 
made to this protracted method of proceeding. Let us 
now advert to some of the plans of this kind which have 
been brought forward, not to notice them in long detail, 
but to point out the principal features in each. 

Some have proposed, by a series of ameliorations 
only, without any compulsory manumissions, gradually 
and almost imperceptibly to extinguish slavery.—In ad- 
dition to what has already been stated, it may be ob- 
served, that this is impracticable; and hence it is that 
the boldest champions of slavery do not object to the 
plan; on the contrary, the most inveterate slave-holders 
readily agree to it, because they know, that, while it 
amuses ws, it is perfectly harmless to their system. 
When, after the experiment already made, might such 
an approximation be supposed to reach the desired point ? _ 
Not, at least, before the equinoctial points had complet- 
ed their revolution through all the signs. When will © 
the period arrive when the slave-masters will consider 
their bondmen fit for freedom ? Can it be expected that 
they will give effect to measures which shall prepare 
their slaves for liberty? We might as well expect 
water to run up hill, or a miser to be lavish of his 


gold.t 


* Clarkson’s Thoughts on the Necessity, &c. pp. 31, 32, &e. 
t In regard to the question whether emancipation shall be zm- 
mediaie or gradual, there is a difference of opinion among those 


LECTURE Iv. 239 


Another plan suggested is, to make all the children 
born after a fixed time free, and in the mean while to 
improve the condition of the present slaves.—As for 
any material improvement in the state of the slaves, 
the whole nation now considers it as hopeless: to talk 
of it is mere trifling, so long as they continue the prop- 
erty of slave-owners. This part of the plan must there- 
fore be given up, for reasons already stated. The 
emancipation of the future children is important, and 
good so far as it goes, but it leaves the actual and ex- 
isting evil untouched. Those who have felt all the mis- 


who are equally opposed to slavery, and are desirous that it should 
at all events be brought to an end in some way or other. One 
thing is certain, that laws ought to be passed, requiring that 
emancipation should take place immediately, or within some def- 
inite and short period, during which, the slaves shall receive that 
moral, intellectual and religious education which shall qualify 
them properly to enjoy their freedom when they shall receive it. 
The idea that instruction can be imparted to slaves while they 
- remain such, and when there is no certainty that they ever will 
be liberated, is altogether preposterous. It would neither be safe 
for the master, nor advantageous for the slave. It would increase 
the danger of insurrections, and would make the slave more dis- 
contented with his lot,—and the only effect of it would be to sow 
distrust, suspicion and enmity between both parties. But if the 
slave knew that he should certainly be made free within a short 
period, he would not only be stimulated to improve every oppor- 
tunity of qualifying himself for this new situation, but would wait 
patiently and contentedly until this time should arrive: But 
whether emancipation be immediate or gradual, the law ought 
to provide the means of educating the slaves, and the planters 
ought individually to make all those personal and benevolent ef- 
forts necessary to secure the effectual operation of such a law.— 
Am. Ep. 


. , : * 
7 . 
240 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


erles of slavery are for that reason to be left to a perpet- 
uation of its evils, while the charities of our hearts are 


to be transferred from their proper objects to a race in 


prospect. If government were actually preparing for 
the enfranchisement of the Negroes now living, and 
were to adopt this as an immediate measure, to arrest 


at once the progress of the evil, we might indeed re-— 


joice; but as a compromise, to pacify those who are 
indignant at the Negro’s wrongs, and are laboring for 
his freedom—as the price of abandoning the present 
race,—who could, who ought, to entertain it for a mo- 
ment? Humanity shudders at the thought of transfer- 
ing all the compassion, and all the energetic effort, 
which, if well directed, and steadily and perseveringly 
employed, might rescue from their miserable thraldrom 
those whose wrongs have been innumerable, to a gene- 
ration which has never seen the light, to children who 
may hereafter exist ! 


, 


It has been proposed to enfranchise all the females.— — 


This goes much further: the freedom of the future chil- 
dren would then be secured, and much grievous suffer- 


ing in the persous of the females would be averted. | 


Still, in this case, must all the unfortunate males be left 
to toil in nearly hopeless bondage; and small would be 
the protection they could afford to their wives and chil- 
dren. Ifso much could be accomplished, it would in- 
deed bea pity if the measure should not be extended, so 
as to complete the work of mercy and of justice. 
Another plan has been, to give the Negro one day in 
the week to labor for himself, and allow him, as soon 
as he has saved money enough, to purchase another 


= 


- 
LECTURE IV. . 241 


day ; and so on till he has procured the redemption of 
the whole of his time.—This, it seems, is already the 
law in the Spanish colonies, or something very similar 
to it; and the result of all the efforts of a free and gene- 
rous nation, is to place the English slaves in as good a 
condition as the slaves of Spain! But why should the 
injured Negro be forced to give, instead of being em- 
powered to receive a compensation ? Remuneration is 
first and principally due to him who has been robbed, 
and spoiled, and crushed to the dust, by this wretched 
system ;—and must he, instead of receiving reparation 
for his wrongs, be forced, by his toil and sweat, to pay 
for that freedom to which he has as just a right as to the 
air he breathes ? 

In fine, to every plan, except to that which gives sub- 
stantial justice to the injured Negro, there seems to be 
serious objections ; and nothing short of his complete 
release from his cruel, tyrannical, and unchristian bonds, 
in the speediest manner, can render to him full justice. 

But it may be asked, How is then their release to be 
effected in a way that shall be both just and practicable ? 
I do not deny that great difficulties may attend the ques- 
tion, and difficulties which it will require the wisdom 
of Parliament to surmount; but they are difficulties 
chiefly arising, not from the untractableness of the slaves, 
but from the inveterate prejudices and obstinacy of the 
masters. It would, however, be presumptuous in me 
to enter into details on such a subject, adverse, espec- 
ially, as I am, on principle, to all temporary expedients. 
But, in truth, it seems neither necessary, nor perhaps 
_ advisable, in our applications to the legislature, to at- 
16 


242 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


tempt to sketch out specific plans: this might only di- 
vide, where all should be united. It will be for the 
wisdom of Parliament to determine the best practicable 
mode of carrying the wishes of the nation into effect. 
Our course is plain and straight-forward: let all our 
efforts be directed, at once and unceasingly, to the com- 
plete extinction of slavery in all the British dominions, 
as early as the adoption of the necessary measures, and 
the carrying of them into effect, will allow. 

Excuse the length to which the remarks on this sub- 
ject have been extended, (too brief, perhaps, for its im- 
portance;) but it was impossible to pass over entirely 
this part of the great question, in treating on the Aboli- 
tion of Slavery. 


Having considered at some length the object to which 
our efforts should be directed, we shall now notice the 
manner in which we should seek its accomplishment, 
An inquiry connected with this part of our subject has 
excited some attention, and certainly deserves consider- 
ation: Should we abstain from the produce of slave la- 
bor, and discourage as far as possible its consumption ? 
There are many articles of this kind which it is diffi- 
cult, if not impossible, to distinguish: there are, how- 
ever, two which may be considered as staple commodi- 
ties of our slave colonies in general—these are sugar 
and rum. It is well known, that what occasions the 
severest labor to the Negroes, the most frequent punish- 
ments, and the most dreadful waste of life, is the culture 
of the sugar-cane, and the manufacture of the sugar and 
rum which are its produce. If spirits must be taken, 


LECTURE IV. 243 


surely it will be no great sacrifice to substitute any oth. 
er instead of rum. But the use of sugar, which may 
be ranked, if not among the necessaries, yet among the 
comforts of life, stands on very different ground. Its 
use isneither immoral nor unhealthy. Nor is the dis- 
use of it necessary to discountenance slavery, since it 
may be obtained from countries where it is raised by 
free labor. But the sugar of the West Indies and the 
Mauritius is raised solely by the toil of the unrequited 
slave, and isthe main support of the slave system. 

There are many, who, from feelings of humanity, 
apart from every other consideration, abstain from slave- 
grown sugar. And shall we blame those who on such 
an account exercise self-denial? How many unspeak- 
able miseries are endured, how many wrongs are in- 
flicted, how much crime is committed, and how many 
lives are shortened, in the production of this article! 
Must it not lessen the pleasure of the tea-table and of 
the dessert, when a reflecting and humane mind consid- 
ers how much suffering to others his enjoyments have 
cost? When David's valiant men broke through the 
host of the Philistines, and brought their chief water 
from the well of Bethlehem, his generous and feeling 
heart would not allow him to taste it, though his lips 
were parched with feverish thirst: “ My God forbid it 
me,” said he, “ that I should do this thing! shall I drink 
the blood of those men that have put their lives in jeop- 
ardy? For with the jeopardy of their lives they 
brought it.” 

There are some who take still higher ground; who 
cannot, consistently with their views of religion, sanc- 


Q44 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


tion a system of violence and cruelty by consuming 
slave-grown sugar. And who shall censure the reso- 
lution to avoid being “ partakers of other men’s sins 7” 
Does it not deserve a serious inquiry, by every consci- 
entious person, who knows the injustice and multiplied 
wickedness of the system, how far it is right im him to 
countenance it, by consuming or dealing in the article 
which is thus produced? In every case of abstinence 
of this kind, there is also a protest made, practically and 
forcibly, against the iniquity of slavery, which cannot 
fail of some effect on others. 

But there is another ground on which the disuse of 
slave sugar is advocated; its supposed tendency towards 
the abolition of the slave system. That this would pro- 
mote the object ifit were sufficiently general is unques- 
tionable. Even by diminishing the Negro’s value as a 
slave, it would facilitate his freedom. It is ascertained 
that the average consumption of sugar in England an- 
nually is about twenty-three pounds to every individual 
of the population ; and it appears, from colonial returns, 
that the average proportion of sugar raised in a year 
for each slave, is about five hundred weight; conse- 
quently, one slave less would he necessary for every 
twenty-five persons who should abstain from slave su- 
gar. If, then, the whole of those in England who hate 
slavery were resolutely to refuse to purchase sugar 
raised by slaves, the system would be materially dis- 
couraged. A great proportion of those who are seek- 
ing the extinction of slavery have not acted on this plan : 
they are hoping that Parliament will listen to the wish- 

-es of the nation, and by its own enactments render a 


LECTURE IV. 245 


measure of this kind unnecessary: should their hopes 
be disappointed, they will, in all probability, have re- 
course to this as alast resort. Whether, all things con- 
sidered, such persons act wisely and properly, I will 
not attempt to decide. There are, however, some pleas 
entered against the disuse of slave sugar, the futility of 
which it requires not many words to prove. “ It is of 
little use,” say some, “to attempt it: what can one in- 
dividual, or a few persons do? If all would adopt this 
plan it might succeed, and we should then have no ob- 
jection to unite.” But numbers are composed of units: 
let each do his part, and the part of the whole will be 
done. Our example may induce others to act in a sim- 
ilar manner. But whatever be the conduct of others, 
let it be our individual concern to act fully up to our 
sense of duty. As we shall not suffer for the delin- 
quencies of others, or the conduct of others, if it fail in 
what we think right, is no excuse for us.—‘ But East- 
India sugar is dearer, and not so good.” As to price, 
there ought to be no difference in sugars of similar 
qualities; and that free-labor sugar can be applied to every 
domestic purpose is sufficiently proved by the fact, that 
many large and respectable families use this only.* 
And what is that benevolence worth which refuses so 
small a sacrifice in the pursuit of its object ?7—But we 
are told that “slaves are employed in the cultivation of 
sugar in the East Indies.” And what is there which 








* After the delivery of this lecture in Bradford, the attention of 
the company was invited to the inspection of wines, conserves, 
and confectionary of various kinds, made with East-India sugar, 
which some ladies had provided for the occasion. 


246 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


the advocates of West-India slavery have not asserted 
in support of their system? It has been proved, in Par- 
liament, and out of Parliament, again and again, that in 
Bengal, the province where the sugar we consume is 
raised, no slaves whatever are employed in its cultiva- 
tion, but free laborers only.* 

Lastly: it has beem supposed that by lessening the 
consumption of sugar, you would injure the slave, and 
render his condition still worse. This has often been 
disproved. We shall not go at length into the argu- 
ment, but briefly advert to circumstances which appear 
satisfactorily to prove the contrary. First, the greater 
the quantity of sugar that is raised, the greater must 
be the number of slaves employed in its culture: 
and the culture of sugar is the most deathful of their 
employments; and, judging by the comparative waste 
of human life in the different colonies, the slave will be 
found to work the harder, and fare the worse, in propor- 
tion to the quantity of sugar which is raised. Let no 
one deceive himself, by imagining that by augmenting 
the value of slave labor you secure his better treatment. 
It will still be only a balance between life and gold. If 
the gain inthe increased quantity, or in the higher price 
of sugar be greater than the loss in the wear and tear 
of the human machinery, will the needy or the avari- 
cious planter hesitate for a moment? If the greater 
consumption, and consequently the greater culture, of 
sugar increased the comfort and tended to the welfare 
of the slaves, their population would be found, generally 
speaking, to increase in proportion. But the very re- 





* See a “Letter to W. Whitmore, Esq.,” on this subject. 


LECTURE IV. 2Q47 


‘verse of this is the case; and, with slight variations, the 
waste of human life is generally proportioned to the 
quantity of sugar annually raised per slave in each 
colony respectively.* 

But whatever subordinate means may now be adopt- 
ed, or, in the event of their failure, whatever ultimate 
measures may be contemplated, our present great effort 
must be to move the Parliament of Britain to put an 
end to slavery. It is our privilege to approach, with 
our entreaties, complaints, and remonstrances, this au- 
gust assembly. 'T’o one class of his Majesty’s subjects 
this privilege is denied, or, what amounts to the same 
thing, its exercise is impossible. There is a power 
which effectually intervenes between them and the pa- 
ternal government of the empire. In vain they sigh 
for that interposition, which alone can give them aid: 
they must not, dare not ask it. But we can give utter- 
ance to their groans, and make their wrongs speak 
in the senate of the nation. We can, on their behalf, 
invoke a power which, if its mighty voice is uttered, 
their oppressors must regard. It is but for Parliament 
to issue its imperial mandate, and the object is accom- 
plished; it is only for the British legislature to throw 
around the Negroes the egis of its protection, and they 
are safe. We should smile at the blustering menaces 
of these little legislatures, and their organs, the colonial 
gazettes, were it not for an indignation, which we can 


* See this clearly exhibited in a tabular view formed from re- 
turns made to Parliament from each colony, in the Anti-slavery 
Reporter, No. 26, also in the Second Report of the Anti-slavery 
Society. 


248 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


scarcely repress, at the outrageous inconsistency of those 
who abuse and threaten the mother country, for the 
least imagined interference with their rights, while 
they can enslave their fellow-creatures by thousands, 
and without remorse or pity deprive them of all that is 
dear to man. In these colonies there is a free Black 
and Colored population, whose loyalty and attachment 
to Britain are well known, and whose efforts, without 
the interference of a single British soldier, if confided 
in, would ensure the failure of any attempt to disturb the 
public peace.* The White colonists tall of their inde- 





* The spiritand temper of the People of Color may be seen 
by the following extracts from The Watchman, a newspaper pub- 
lished by the People of Color in Jamaica: they relate to some 
violent language which had been used inthe House of Assembly, 
of that island, respecting a disruption from Great Britain and an 
union with the United States. ‘We can tell every contuma- 
cious member of the House of Assembly, that, if America had 
ten times the population she possesses, she would find herself in- 
capable of wresting this or any other of the colonies from the 
mighty grasp of the parent state.’—“Jamaica would rise in 
mass.” ‘ Before the tocsin of war is sounded, the House of As- 
sembly would do well to commence the system of exterminating 
the Colored population, who are loyal to a man.”—“ In the As- 
sembly of Jamaica,” it is added, “if they dared to unfold the flag 
of rebellion, every man of them would be hanged in twenty-four 
hours, without reference to the judge or jury. England has a 
standing army in her loyal and devoted subjects of Jamaica; so 
that the puny threat of a seditious Assembly excitesonly a return 
of ridicule and contempt.” 

It is gratifying to find that the People of Color, who are nu- 
merous, and many of them wealthy and respectable, are likely to 
be important coadjutors in carrying into effect the wishes of the 
British nation respecting the extinction of slavery. In this they 
are wise; for as long as that hateful system continues, they will 
besubject to an unmerited degradation: they never can, in the 
very nature of things, rise to their proper level in society, till 
Negro slavery be abolished. On their views with reference to 
this subject, see some interesting extracts in the Anti-Slavery 
Reporter, No, 60, 


4 


LECTURE IV. 249 


pendence! But what could they do without England ? 
Would they bring their sugars here, if they could find 
a better market elsewhere? Would they compel us to 
save a million or two annually, by purchasing the pro- 
duce of free labor? What would they do without our 
armies and our fleets to defend them, and our bounties 
and protecting duties to maintain their monopoly? Their 
independence in this case would be that of a fragile 
boat cut adrift from the vessel to which it belonged, in 
the midst of the ocean. But the colonists know better, 
and all their vaporing is but to serve a purpose. How- 
ever great the clamor of opposition which might be rais- 
ed, in a prospect of a restoration of their rights to the 
unjustly enslaved Negroes, it would soon subside, if 
that measure were once carried in Parliament. What 
awful predictions were uttered by the colonists and 
their supporters, while the abolition of the slave trade 
was pending! What an outcry of alarm and ruin was 
then raised! And now, what is become of all their dis- 
mal forebodings® So it would be in a short time with the 
enfranchisement of the slaves; and succeeding genera- 
tions will in this, as in the former case, smile and mar- 
vel at all the boisterous threatenings and abuse, which 
are now employed to deter us from our purpose; and 
at those ill-omened vaticinations which they are now 
croaking in our ears. 

The power of the British Parliament is like that of 
those mighty engines with which you are surrounded: * 
its potency, when brought properly into action, is re- 


* It will be remembered that these Lectures were first deliv- 
ered in the midst of a manufacturing population. 


250 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


sistless. But if this be the steam engine, public opinion 
is the steam, without which it will never work; but, 
set In motion by that, it can do wonders. “If the 
whole of the middle class of society in this country,’ 
said Lord Calthorpe, “ were but strongly to express their 
opinion, slavery could not continuea single day.” It is 
the business, then, of every friend of the oppressed Negro 
to raise and bring into action this mighty engine, by 
circulating information, by forming auxiliary societies, 
by holding meetings—by every means which can warm 
the humane feelings of the heart, and keep them warm 
—till from millions of free and generous hearts that ex- 
pansive agent shall arise, and, issuing through innu- 
merable petitions into both Houses of Parliament, shall 
set the giant power of that engine at work, which by 
one sublime stroke of its arm, shall dash in pieces the 
fetters of 800,000 slaves. 

And let us remember how important it is, to the ac- 
complishment of our object, that Parliament be com- 
posed of men who with fearless integrity will advocate 
the cause of our fellow-subjects. This depends in a 
great measure on the people themselves. Whenever 
you are called to exercise the elective franchise, let this 
be an essential qualification in every candidate, that he 
will vote for the abolition of slavery in the speediest 
practicable manner, Listen not to professions of a wil- 
lingness to ameliorate their condition, and to favor a 
gradual abolition—these are, in general, meant only to 
deceive—let the early extinction of slavery be the 
pledge required. Not only is this of consequence to the 
liberation of the Negroes from their thraldom, but be 


LECTURE Iv. 251 


assured that the advocates of slavery are not fit persons 
to be entrusted with the liberties of Englishmen. 

Friends of humanity, lovers of freedom, followers of 
the Saviour, what further considerations need be ad- 
duced to urge you to exertion on the poor slaves’ be- 
half? Ifthe statements which we have made are true, 
if the arguments which we have advanced are sound, 
who can be justified in remaining an inactive spectator 
of the great conflict now pending between the genius of 
liberty, and the demon of oppression ? 

What an appeal does the condition of the enslaved 
Negroes make to your benevolence !—If it is benevolent 
to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to relieve the 
poor; surely it is no less so by the hope of freedom to 
“bind up the broken in heart;” by the prospect of lib- 
eration from their wrongs to “comfort those that mourn;” 
to raise a human being from the condition of a laboring 
beast to that of a man; and to give the opportunity of 
instruction to those who are “ perishing for lack of 
knowledge.” In how many channels does British be- 
nevolence flow! how diversified are the objects which 
it embraces! There is scarcely an ill that afflicts man- 
kind, which it does not regard. Its activity is brought 
to bear on whatever relates to the body or the mind, to 
the wants of the rising race or to the infirmities of age, 
to the sufferings of our own countrymen, or to those of 
foreigners. To meet these various exigencies, what 
sums are expended, what efforts are made, what an ap- 
paratus of means is put in requisition! And shall the 
case of the unhappy slaves form the only exception ? 
On this occasion alone, shall benevolence be dormant, 


Zoe LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


when its aid is implored on behalf of nearly a million 
of human beings, who, under the sanction of the British 
government, are pining away their lives in bitter bon- 
dage, destructive alike to their bodies and their souls; 
and who are annually diminishing in number through 
the various mischiefs of the slave system ? 

Is not a strong appeal also made to your patriotism ? 
—If you love your country, and wish her to rank high 
among the nations, aid in wiping from her character 
this foul stain, and in relieving her from the just, and 
therefore bitter, reproach, of boasting of liberty and yet 
retaining slaves; of persuading other nations to cease 
from man-stealing, while she will not give up the fruits 
of her past plunder; of sacrificing at once to God and 
mammon. If you wish your own loved country to take 
the lead in just and humane legislation, urge her at 
once to interpose in favor of Negro freedom; or she 
will, in all probability, be soon compelled to take a 
mortifying position, in the rear of those of whom she 
has always been in advance. If you wish those judg- 
ments to be averted which have always sooner or later 
overtaken every nation that has sanctioned vice and op- 
pression ; if you wish England to avoid the fate of Nin- 
eveh and Babylon and Tyre; arise, and, with a voice 
so strong and general as must compel attention, bid her, 
in the name of Him who can dry up every stream of 
our commerce, blast our prosperity, and bring our glo- 
ry tothe dust; bid her, in the name of that just and 
merciful Being, who is the God of the Black man as 
well as of the White, without delay to “loose the bands 
of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, to let the op- 


LECTURE IV. 253 


pressed go free, and to break every yoke.” So will 
“the blessing of him that was ready to perish” come 
upon us; so may we hope for the favor and protection 
of Him who “rules in the armies of heaven, and 
amongst the inhabitants of the earth.” 

Nor is your piety less the object of appeal.— Where 
ean we see so much sin and so much suffering to awak- 
en every feeling of Christian compassion, and to call 
for the exercise of Christian zeal, as in our slave colo- 
nies? What a field would be open for the pious mis- 
sionary, if all our slaves were liberated! No people to 
whom the gospel has been sent have appeared to em- 
brace it so willingly, and to submit to its instructions 
with so much docility, as these poor slaves, when op- 
portunity has been afforded to them. And remember, 
that in these colonies there are twenty or thirty thousand 
of them who have joined various religious societies, 
whom we are taught to consider as “brethren in the 
Lord.” And these fellow-creatures, fellow-subjects, and 
fellow-Christians, are subject to the most brutal treat- 
ment. ‘Themselves, their wives, their children, may 
have their flesh mangled by the whip, may be sold by 
auction, may be prevented from the enjoyment of every 
Christian privilege, and from the performance of every 
religious duty but what is strictly private, at the mere 
will and pleasure of any persecuting slave-master. 
They may be, and some of them have been, and are, 
flogged and worked in chains, like felons, for attending 
religious meetings and for attempting to pray! Can 
you rest on your pillows while you remember these 
things? Can you think of the martyred Smith and 


“yy 


254 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


Grimsdall; of the vexatious persecutions of those holy 
and disinterested men who have left all the endearments 
of home, not for the gains of commerce, or the pursuit 
of science, but to bring the poor sufferimg Negro to an 
acquaintance with the Saviour, and to pour into his 
heart the consolations which he so much needs: can 
you think of these things, and feel your conscience easy 
while no strenuous effort is made to abolish that unholy, 
unchristian, inhuman system, from which it all springs? 
For the sake of all that the slave suffers; for the sake 
of all the immorality and guilt which the system entails 
on the planters; for the sake of England, which is de- 
filed by this polluted and accursed thing; for the sake 
of Europe, to whom England should not be an exam- 
ple; for the sake of the whole human family; rise 
from your supineness, put forth all your energies, nor 
rest till you have chased this destructive demon from 
the British dominions. 

Allow me to caution you against two things which 
might relax your efforts—In the first place, do not 
reckon on an easy victory. This is no time to slum- 
ber. The adverse interests are numerous and power- 
ful. Several of the Nobility are slave-holders; and in 
the House of Commons there is a phalanx of West-In- 
dia proprietors and merchants, whose united votes are 
formidable to Ministers. The wealth of those who are 
interested in the support of slavery is immense, their 
connexions extensive, and their influence great; a con- 
siderable portion of the periodical press appears to be 
enlisted in their service. Nothing can ensure success 


LECTURE Iv. 950 


to this sacred cause, but a determined, united, and per- 
severing effort. 

Nor, on the other hand, yield to such a desponding 
view of the case as renders exertion hopeless. In such 
a country, under such a government, at such a time as 
this, when the power of public opinion, if steadily main- 
tained, is sure to bear down every obstacle, what may 
not persevering effort accomplish? What has it not 
accomplished? There isno need to ransack history to 
furnish proof of this, though our national records are 
rich in instructive examples of success: our own times 
supply us with memorable instances of what has been 
effected by united, determined, and unwearied exertion. 
What was it that at length opened India to the light of 
Christianity, and has extinguished the fires of the Indian 
suttee ? What was it which has restored the conscien- 
tious Dissenter to the full privileges of the British con- 
stitution; and has determined the great question re- 
specting the Roman Catholics, so long agitated and so 
strenuously opposed? Did not the abolition of the 
slave trade itself encounter quite as much opposition as 
is now made, or can be made, to the enfranchisement of 
the enslaved Negroes? Yet, as often as the friends of hu- 
manity were driven back, they returned again to the at- 
tack, determined rather to die in the breach, than to sur- 
render their arms or to give up their cause; and after a 
contest of twenty years the great object was obtained, and 
success crowned their efforts. Let no failures of the past, 
no difficulties of the present, discourage us. What if 
the conflict be arduous and long, if many a campaign 
remains yet to be fought; the prize, the glorious prize 


256 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


of humanity, for which we are contending, is worth it 
all. 

And in this holy warfare let each be determined to 
do his part; let no one be content to leave it to others: 
every one may contribute something to the general 
stock of power and effect. You that have property, 
spare it not in such a cause, when funds are necessary. 
You who have time, give a portion of it freely to ad- 
vance such an object. You who have influence, exert 
it in the cause of misery. Masters of families, heads of 
seminaries, let all within your respective spheres imbibe 
a spirit of hatred to slavery and compassion for the in- 
jured Negro. Let the kind efforts of that sex be brought 
into requisition, in whose hearts charity has ever found 
an asylum, and whose influence we feel from the cradle 
to the tomb. Let the ministers of religion engage the 
sympathies of their listening audiences on behalf of this 
truly Christian object; and let all who pray, present 
the sorrows and the sufferings of the injured African 
before our common “ Father who is in heaven.” 

Be assured our cause must finally triumph. Wheth- 
er this enemy of the African fall by our hands or not, 
fall he must; whether this evil be removed by gentle 
means or by some violent catastrophe, removed it cer- 
tainly will be: it is an unsightly excrescence on the 
institutions of civilized society, which will not be allow- 
ed to continue: it is a sight too revolting, now that the 
light of day shines on it, for the nineteenth century to 
endure. Seethe changes that are taking place in South 
America, in the neighborhood of some of our slave col- 
onies; and all in favor of freedom. Look at Hayti, 


LECTURE IV. 257 


within sight of Jamaica—till lately a slave island—now 
an empire of free Blacks, fast rising in power, increas- 
ing rapidly in numbers and in wealth. Will not the 
slaves inevitably become acquainted with the whole 
case? The light which has arisen is penetrating every 
crevice, and, in spite of every effort to prevent it, it will 
reach the Negro race. Look at the general aspect of 
the times—the vast increase of knowledge, the march 
of popular liberty, the tremblings of despotism ;—is it 
possible that slavery can be perpetuated? The angel 
of freedom is on his march; the doom of slavery is 
already pronounced; the millstone is cast into the sea, 
which is the type and presage of its fall, its utter disap- 
pearance, to be seen nomore. Oh that Britain may be 
wise, and accomplish that work of mercy, which the 
course of events may otherwise effect ina manner which 
all may deplore! 

But, whatever may be the result of our efforts, let 
them not cease. ‘“ Be not weary in well-doing.” We 
are accountable for our fidelity and diligence, but not 
for our success. We are in a world in which error, 
and vice, and “ spiritual wickedness in high places,” are 
making war on the peace and happiness of mankind. 
Every friend of truth and justice and humanity and pie- 
ty is called to a holy warfare; to range himself under 
these sacred banners, in order, by combined and vigo- 
rous efforts, to purify the vices of a sinful world, and to 
lessen the miseries of a suffering world. This cause 
will ultimately prevail, whether we do our part or not; 
but, happy for us, if we shall be found to have aided its 
triumphs! The hour is coming, when we shall retire 

17 


258 LECTURES ON SLAVERY. 


from the field; and, oh! will it not refresh our spirits 
in that solemn season, to remember that we have not 
lived entirely for ourselves; that we have, through the 
Divine blessing, done something to make the miserable 
happy, and to raise 800,000 wretched slaves to the priv- 
ileges of men, and to the happiness of Christianity ? 
And should we meet in a brighter world, uniting with 
that assembly which shall be composed of men “ of all 
nations and people and tongues and kindred,” those 
whom our efforts have contributed to emancipate and 
ehristianize, will it not repay all our “labor of love,” 
even if it could be multiplied a thousand-fold ? 


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